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OLD ENGLAND: 



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ITS SCENERY, ART, AND PEOPLE. 



BY 






JAMES M. HOPPLN, 

PKOFESSOK IN YALE COLLEGE. 







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,<V 



CX NEW YORK: 
PUBLISHED BY HURD AND HOUGHTON, 

459 Broome Street. 
1867. 






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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by 

James M. Hoppin, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Connecticut. 






Ul 



RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE: 

STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY 

H. 0. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY. 



PREFACE. 



The motive which has chiefly led to the publica- 
tion of the following recollections of English travel, 
has been the hope of exerting some little influence 
upon our countrymen who go abroad, to induce 
them to spend more time in England than they 
are commonly inclined to do, and to see that 
country more thoroughly, instead of making it a 
stepping-stone to the Continent. 

There have been heretofore, it is true, good 
reasons for this disinclination of Americans to 
remain very long in England ; but these rea- 
sons do not now exist, or at least to the extent 
that they once did. And it hardly need be said, 
that there is no country which contains so much 
of absorbing interest to a thoughtful American 
as Old England; finding there as he does the 
head-springs of the life and power of his own 
nation, and in almost every object that his eye 
rests upon, seeing that which (a short two cen- 
turies ago) formed part of his own history. He 



IV PREFACE. 

finds there the complement of the life of the New 
World. It is especially good for his intensely 
active American nature to come in contact with 
the slower and graver spirit of England, and it 
thereby gains calmness and sobered strength. 

I do not profess in these pages to present much 
that is new or comprehensive in relation to so well- 
known a country as England ; but I have striven 
to draw a faithful though rapid picture of the 
English portion of the island, going from Tweed- 
mouth to Land's End, touching upon nearly every 
county, and making the entire circuit of the land. 
The English Cathedrals have particularly attracted 
me, and I have loved to linger in their majestic 
shadows ; and for the sake of younger readers, 
some account has been given of the history and 
progress of Architecture in England. 

I have everywhere spoken with the freedom 
which an American is accustomed to exercise upon 
all subjects, and yet in no spirit of bitterness or 
hostility, but, on the contrary, in a spirit of rever- 
ence and love for the great land of our fathers. 



CONTENTS. 



» 

CHAPTER PAGB 

I. Liverpool to London 1 

II. London 25 

III. London Art and the London Pulpit ... 42 

IV. Environs of London 70 

V. Homes of Arnold and Cowper .... 84 

VI. Weston Underwood to Cheltenham . . 99 

VII. Cheltenham, Bristol, and Gloucester . . 115 

VIII. Worcester to Dudley ... . . . 130 

IX. Lichfield to Matlock 152 

X. Matlock to Manchester . . . . . 171 

XI. The Lake Country 189 

XII. The Lake Country (continued) . . . 205 

XIII. TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH 219 

XIV. Home of the Pilgrims . 241 

XV. Lincoln to Ely ........ 252 

XVI. The Universities 265 

XVII. London to Folkestone 305 

XVIII. Tunbridge Wells to Isle of Wight . , 325 

XIX. Southampton to Salisbury . . . . . 344 

XX. South Devon and Torquay ..... 361 

XXI. Cornwall and Penzance ..... 382 

XXII. Land's End 407 

XXIII. North Devon and Wells ..... 424 

XXIV. Glastonbury and the Wye .... 441 



OLD ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER I. 

LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 

Solid, unromantic Liverpool, whose greatness is 
entirely of modern growth, though its charter dates 
back to the twelfth century, will not detain us ; for 
it is too much like Boston, or one of our own large 
commercial cities. 

Red-walled Chester, also, which is invariably the 
next step of an American traveler who longs to see 
something of Old England, — something different 
from what he sees at home, — has been so often de- 
scribed, that I will begin my story at once in the 
railway carriage flying out of Chester westward to 
Bangor ; for I intend to take my reader to London 
around by the way of North Wales, which is by far 
the most interesting route, and which, if not taken 
at first, is not apt to be passed over upon one's 
return. 

Emerson calls an English railway carriage, " a 
cushioned cannon-ball." There is a wonderfully 
smooth rapidity upon an English railway ; and yet 
with all this speed, one has a great sense of personal 



2 OLD ENGLAND. 

security. Were the American system of checking 
luggage adopted, there would be an improvement. 
It depends upon word-of-mouth communication 
whether one's trunks go with one and stop with 
one ; and thus by mere good luck they are shifted 
and passed along. Sometimes a label is pasted, but 
at most places one is told that labels are not used ; 
for the idea seems to be that the owner himself 
should mark, or at least look out for, his own lug- 
gage. This may be done for considerable distances, 
but it is impracticable for tourists making frequent 
stops in the course of a day. It is the best plan for 
a traveler in England, to take with him a simple 
portmanteau that he can carry in his hand. The 
first-class carriage is truly luxurious, light and 
splendid with plate-glass sides, and furnished with 
capacious springy seats, and with every accommo- 
dation for the bestowing of bundles, hats, and um- 
brellas. The second-class carriage forms a lament- 
able contrast to this ; it is as hard, bare, and un- 
comely a box as oak boards can make it ; its seats 
are uncushioned, and frequently dirtied by the bas- 
kets and boots of railway workmen, market-men, 
and " tramps." There seems to be little or no dis- 
tinction between the second and third class car- 
riages excepting in this, that the second-class car- 
riages are resorted to by the most respectable peo- 
ple, on account of the expensiveness of the first. 
But let me say a word of commendation of the 
English railway porters : they are true friends of 
the traveler, being easily distinguishable in a 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 3 

crowd from their dress of black velveteen, and are 
always at the right spot to afford assistance, to re- 
lieve one of his parcels, to point out the booking 
office, to put the luggage in the right carriage, in 
fact to do all that can be done, — and to expect no 
fee for it. I was always tempted to break the strict 
letter of the law, and to reward these men for such 
efficient service. 

On leaving Chester the railway runs along the 
artificial canal made for the channel of the Dee. 
The river widens toward its mouth into a shallow 
bay, forming an enormous bed of shifting sand, 
covered grandly with the water at full tide, but 
shrinking into dribbling rills and petty ditches at 
ebb. As one speeds along he catches distant views 
of the Welsh Mountains on the left, and on the 
right lies the broad river Dee, and soon the sea it- 
self. The green valleys run up into the highlands, 
and now and then a castellated mansion, or ruined 
tower, or genuine old castle is seen, hanging on the 
slope of the hills. The road from about this point 
to Bangor is a triumph of engineering skill. 
Sometimes the track is crowded between the 
mountains and the sea so narrowly, that in stormy 
weather the cars are dashed by the waves. The 
tunnels and the tubular and suspension bridges at 
Conway are stupendous w r orks. With the solid 
piers of the bridges, and the massive old castle 
above, Conway is a city of the Anakim. After 
crossing the bridge here one comes into Caernar- 
vonshire, which of all the Welsh counties con- 



4 OLD ENGLAND. 

tains the most rugged and characteristic Welsh 
scenery. Soon the track runs around the project- 
ing rocks of Penmaen-bach and Penmaen-maur, 
precipitous crags jutting out like great foreheads 
into the sea, and which were the former terror of 
travelers. Dr. Johnson records the peril he felt in 
climbing the dizzy road which once crept around 
their sea-face. Now these formidable crags are 
tunnelled, the first cut being six hundred and thirty 
yards long, through flint rock. 

Bangor (derived from " ban gor " or the " great 
circle," a generic British word for a " religious con- 
gregation " or " fraternity ") is situated along a 
narrow ravine, with a mountain at its back, and 
Beaumaris Bay in front. It is the seat of a bish- 
opric, and is one of the oldest centres of a still more 
primitive faith ; for here doubtless existed a pure 
Christianity before the time of Augustine, the re- 
puted apostle of England. A profound spirituality 
still characterizes the religion of these Welsh peo- 
ple. They are held, even by Englishmen, to be 
the best kind of dissenters, because they are firmly 
attached to their own ancient and simple forms, 
rather than jealously antagonistic to the forms of 
the Established Church. That the Spirit of God 
can reach them through their more rigid modes of 
thought and worship, the many powerful reforma- 
tions of religion which have visited them, and espe- 
cially that of 1860, which spread over and lighted 
up these old mountains, may testify. 

Travelers must be allowed to talk and even 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 5 

grumble about hotels ; for these are often the only 
" interiors " they see, and they sometimes form the 
only means strangers have of judging of the style 
of living, and of a hundred little things in the com- 
mon life of a people. One is made exceedingly 
comfortable at a first-class English hotel, but there 
is a stiffness about it which is not apt to be found 
in the best American or Continental hotels. Sel- 
dom is there a public table ; and if the party com- 
prise ladies, one is forced, even if staying for a 
single day, to take a private parlor. But I am 
quite converted to the English private parlor. 
After a long day's journey in heat and dust, strug- 
gling on with an eager and vexed human current, 
to be ushered into one's own room, quiet as a room 
at home, furnished often with books and every lux- 
ury and comfort, this goes some way toward recom- 
pensing the traveler for the exclusiveness of the 
thing. He is, it is true, entirely isolated. If his 
dearest friend were dying in the next room, he 
would not find it out, for seldom is there a registry- 
book kept in an English hotel. And one rarely 
risks a question to the dignified and taciturn waiter, 
with gravity and white cravat enough to be the 
Dean of Westminster. 

The best English hotels have one feature that it 
were surely well for us to imitate. They are not 
altogether confined to interior magnificence and 
showy upholstery, but have generally a pleasant 
breathing-space of ornamental grounds and garden 
about them. In the dry heart of busy cities, there 



6 OLD ENGLAND. 

will be a few flower-beds, a bit of green grass, and 
walks enough at least to turn around in. At the 
" Penryhn Arms " in Bangor, the garden is truly 
beautiful. It is laid out in star and crescent shaped 
beds, fringed with bright flowers, and the grass is 
soft and springy with moss. It slopes off toward 
the water, commanding a fine view of the harbor, 
the entrance of the Menai Strait, the Bay of Beau- 
maris, and the opposite mountainous shore of the 
island. When I first saw it, the harbor of Bangor 
had a very odd appearance. The tide was out, and 
a vast mud-bank swept smoothly and steeply down 
to the deeper abyss beyond. The vessels looked as 
though they were climbing up this immense bill- 
side of mud. Some stood erect ; some were heeled 
over ; some were stern-foremost to the sea ; and 
some were hitched painfully up sideways upon the 
bank. The flags nevertheless were all gallantly 
flying. 

I shall not attempt to describe the remarkable 
bridges over the Menai Strait ; but cannot pass by 
the view of the Strait itself, and its surroundings, 
as seen from the roof of the Britannia Tubular 
Bridge. It is an epitome of almost all that is great 
in Nature and the works of man. 

On the Caernarvon side of the Strait are seen the 
craggy mountains of Wales, that looked blue and 
soft in the misty distance, while the hazy morning 
sun filled the spaces between their summits with 
that undefined and vapory light which the artist 
loves. Yet their rugged outline, culminating in 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 7 

the sharp-pointed cone of Snowdon, could be per- 
fectly seen to the southeast. To the south, on the 
island itself, was the ancient Druidic grove, in the 
midst of whose shadows stood the white walls of 
the Plas Newydd, the seat of the Marquis of An- 
glesea. More than a hundred feet immediately be- 
low,, raved and whirled the broad Strait itself; not 
a river, nor a sea, but something of both. In some 
places it is two miles in breadth, its sides precipi- 
tous and its banks thickly wooded. The sea, as if 
chafed by its narrow walls, looks petulant and an- 
gry, though here and there it is entirely smooth in 
back-setting pools. Vessels sailing through the 
Strait are at the mercy of the currents and tide ; 
now they crowd sail for one bank, and now they 
drift like a loo* to the other. In a storm the scene 
must be magnificent, such an ocean race-way as it 
is. How the great green billows would leap and 
chase each other through the long gorge ! There 
is a fisherman's small white house standing on a 
low rock almost in the middle of the Strait, which, 
with its irregular shape, its lines of fishing-stakes 
set around it, and its bold insulated position, is a 
picturesque object. The water boils and swirls 
around it, and rushes by it with tremendous ra- 
pidity. Indeed, this whole channel reminded me 
of the formidable gorge of Niagara River just below 
the Falls, filled with its vexed, foam-streaked, and 
green-colored flood. 

At the completion of the central tower of the 
" Britannia Tubular Bridge," which is two hun- 



8 OLD ENGLAND. 

dred and thirty feet high, and holds the whole 
structure in its strong hand, Mr. Stephenson said : 
" Let them not, any more than himself, and all 
who have been connected with this great work, 
forget that whatever may have been, or whatever 
may be the ability, science, intelligence, and zeal 
brought to bear on the creature's works, it is to the 
Creator we should offer praise and thanksgiving ; 
for without his blessing on our works, how can we 
expect them to prosper? He fully believed that 
Providence had been pleased to smile on the under- 
taking, and he hoped that they all with him would 
endeavor to obtain those smiles." It is pleasant to 
see such a simple faith in a mind devoted to so ma- 
terial a science as mechanics. Who can say that 
the deep secrets of Nature which such a mind 
grasped, were not also the fruit of this faith, just as 
truly as if he had thought and labored in purely 
spiritual things. Truly they build strong who thus 
build. 

It is but a short distance of some nine miles by 
rail from Bangor to Caernarvon on the Menai 
Strait, where are the ruins of the majestic castle of 
the ancient kings of England, who finally suc- 
ceeded in dominating over Wales, partly by force 
and partly by politic concession. Height gives the 
singular majesty which is so marked in the remains 
of Caernarvon Castle ; and some of its loftiest 
towers are still perfect to the topmost stone. 
There are thirteen of these towers, most of them 
being surmounted by tall slim turrets. From the 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 9 

water side the aspect of the " Eagle Tower," from 
which the broad flag of England floats, is imposing. 
The principal entrance of the castle has a sober 
grandeur that all the changes of time cannot de- 
stroy. A featureless statue of King Edward I. 
stands above the gateway arch. An area of three 
acres is said to be inclosed by the walls. It is a 
good place to study the plan and details of an early 
mediaeval castle built on the largest scale of regal 
magnificence. The soldiers' quarters, prisons, sta- 
bles, granaries, kitchen, servants' rooms, chapel, 
royal chambers, banquet hall, jousting yard, can 
still be perfectly made out. There seems to have 
been a proud and complete separation kept up be- 
tween the military and civil departments. But 
lord and servant are now one. Jackdaws have 
poked their sticks in the windows of queens' cham- 
bers ; and it would not be possible for the lightest 
maiden's foot to traverse the battlements upon 
which kings have walked and mused. Stairways 
hang broken midway ; the sides of great towers 
have rushed down, taking the heart out of them ; 
the stone eagles on the turrets of the Eagle Tower 
are reduced to black, shapeless, wingless blocks ; 
and well has it been called " that worm-eaten keep 
of ragged stone." The first Prince of Wales was 
born in this castle, but the room shown as his birth- 
place is not probably authentic. 

The first part of the ride from Caernarvon to 
Llanberis, a distance of ten miles, is a slow ascent, 
and has no peculiar interest; and yet one has an 



10 OLD ENGLAND. 

opportunity to see the miniature white stone farm- 
houses, with their black funereal-looking wooden 
porticoes, and the small black Welsh cattle dotting 
the hill-sides. The farms appear to be principally 
grazing farms, and they become more and more 
rocky and unpromising as one approaches the hills, 
the stones growing as thick as in a New Hampshire 
sheep-pasture. After some five miles, the moun- 
tains of the Snowdon range are seen over the lower 
hills in advance, rising by one bound in a bold wall 
from the plain ; and through a narrow rock-portal, 
like that at Cluses on the way from Geneva to 
Chamouni, one enters the mountains. " Snow- 
don " is a later Saxon name ; the more ancient 
British name of this range is said to signify " Eagle- 
ridge " or " Eagle-crag-ridge." The craggy and 
wild characteristics of a mountain pass are now be- 
fore and around ; and one soon begins to skirt the 
shores of the small twin lakes of Llanberis- These 
are insignificant in size, it is true, — rather ponds 
than lakes, — but the upper and inner one of some 
ten miles in length, is a singular sheet of water, 
lying smooth and glassy in the shadow of gloomy 
and verdureless mountains. The sharp-edged and 
splintered character of the slaty mountains of Wales 
adds to their sombreness, — being almost literally 
black, — and when wet glistening and gleaming 
fiercely in the sun, and their immense shelving 
precipices of sheer rock well atone for their want 
of great height ; for a thousand feet of bare Alpine 
precipice always looks grander than three thousand 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 11 

feet of wooded and gentle descent. The view from 
the top of Snowdon is said to be one of the noblest 
in England, commanding as from a central throne 
all of rocky Wales, the sea, the island of Anglesea, 
and the highest points of England, Scotland, and 
Ireland. And another interest attaches itself to 
this broken range of Welsh mountains ; they are 
held by the best modern geologists to form the old- 
est portion of the island of England. They rose 
first of all from the waters ; and around them, as a 
solitary nucleus in the ocean of the earliest period 
of creation, the rest of the land was gradually 
formed. We tread here on the primitive land of 
Britain. We are at the head source of her an- 
tiquity, before a living thing had appeared. 

On the further shore of the lake of Llyn Peris is 
a vast slate quarry scooped out of the mountain 
side, and lying open to view, resembling a gigantic 
Roman amphitheatre with its regular rows of seats. 
A small locomotive puffs and smokes along at the 
foot of the Alt Du Mountain, to carry slates to 
Caernarvon, whence they are shipped to all parts 
of the kingdom, and to America. Slate constitutes 
the wood of this region. It shingles the roof, clap- 
boards the wall, makes the door, floors the room, 
and builds the fence. Tall boards of it, knitted to- 
gether with wire, form a very strong, enduring, 
and neat style of fence ; so that a farmer could con- 
veniently make all his " calculations " while swing- 
ing on his gate, — as the farmer boys are said to 
do in Yankee land. 



12 OLD ENGLAND. 

After passing through the village of Llanberis, 
the real mountain Pass in its true wildness and toil- 
someness begins ; it is a rough scene ; for the bed 
of the Pass is strewn with vast fragments of rock 
torn from the crags above ; and in and out and 
among these the road wearily turns and winds ; the 
walls of naked cliff rise boldlv on either hand : and 
the only relief to this savage desolation is now and 
then a little clump of fox-gloves, that push up their 
slender stems, hung with spikes of faintly crimson 
nodding bells, from the crevices of the grim rocks. 

From the summit of the Pass, a descending road 
of five miles, affording more free and open views 
of the irregular mountains of the Snowdon range, 
brings us to Capel Curig, which is the centre of 
the best scenery in Wales ; for Southern Wales 
is by no means so grand in its mountain scenery, 
although it contains much that is boldly picturesque ; 
and there is no place also which commands such 
fine points of view within such short distances. 
Capel Curig is a spot where one would be satisfied 
to stay day after, day, until the snow and storms 
of winter made it dreary. The inn is a comfortable 
and neat one, built almost entirely of slate, within 
and without. Maps, books, a quiet parlor, a clean 
table, and a tasteful garden, — these are charms for 
any man ; and then, by a few steps out of the house, 
or by a climb up the steep hill at its back to a little 
grassy alp or mountain pasture, one comes to perfect 
solitude, with a noble view of the whole pyramidal 
mass of Snowdon in the distance, and a tranquil 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 13 

valley with a gleam of peaceful waters at your feet. 
The wild flowers upon this hill-side appeared to 
me to be wonderfully lovely ; but with the exception 
of the fox-glove, they were generally very small, 
such as hare-bells, daisies, crow's-foot, and heather 
blossoms ; and the very grass seemed to be filled 
with the most minute moss-smothered flowers, too 
delicate even for fragrance. Wales is a favorite 
botanizing region, and its ferns, heathers, and all 
kinds of mountain plants, are of exquisite beauty 
and numberless variety. 

The road on toward Corwen, passes through a 
region gradually growing less rocky, and milder, 
and more fertile in its character ; the lofty sides of 
the vale of Llugwy are covered to the summit 
with larches, — beautiful trees when found standing 
together in a wood, — making pointed lines of the 
greatest regularity and softest hue. A step from 
the road through the larch-forest brings one to the 
"verge of the " cataract of the Swallow ; " something 
more than a pretty waterfall, for without being on 
a very large scale, it is really beautiful. The light 
penetrating through such a dense mass of foliage, 
and struggling in upon the water, is itself of a. rich 
emerald green. A little beyond is Bettwys-y-Coed, 
the shady and romantic summer retreat of landscape 
painters, reminding one of our own picturesque 
Conway in sight of the White Hills. The church 
at Corwen, just back of the inn, is of fabulous 
antiquity; and its gray churchyard is patriarchal 
in appearance, like that of Ramlah, or the old 



14 OLD ENGLAND. 

Hebrew burial-ground in Prague. It has a monu- 
ment of Owen Glendower. Was not his name 
derived from the river Dee ? 

It was market-day at Corwen, and the costumes 
were primitive, particularly the high hat of the 
peasant women, which, when crowning strong and 
masculine features gives the impression of a man 
being under it, especially if the whole figure is not 
at first seen. One may still meet in Wales the 
conical " cappan " or cap, which is said to come 
down from the most ancient British days. 

From Corwen to Llangollen, we come again 
upon the romantic river Dee, here in its impetu- 
ous youth. It was the sacred stream, the " Diuw," 
the Divine, of the ancient Welsh ; and few rivers 
of the same length link together more opposite or 
striking scenes, — the quiet Bala lake and the 
ocean, splendid modern Eaton Hall and venerable 
old Chester, the rocky Welsh mountains and the 
broad tranquil Cheshire meadows. We now reach 
the region of cultivated fields, of flowering hedges, 
and the white briar wild rose ; the Berwyn hills 
rise steeply from the valley ; and indeed the scen- 
ery now becomes a succession of changing and 
lovely valleys — Llangollen the loveliest of all. 
This vale spreads out into wide and majestic pro- 
portions, its barriers of high green hills receding 
and rolling away gently toward the east, forming 
the very heart of all that is rich and lovely in 
Welsh scenery. 

Coming out of Wales, the first natural stopping 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 15 

place is "good old Shrewsbury." Shrewsbury, in 
the county of Shropshire, or Salop, is the ideal of 
a hearty English town, comfortable and quaint ; it 
is still fit to live in, which cannot be said of some 
old towns, such, for instance, as Chester, which is 
too antique for modern breadth and convenience ; 
but it appeared to me as if the good citizens of 
Shrewsbury, with their Welsh mutton, shady trees, 
quiet walks and rippling Severn River, lived as 
handsomely and happily as any people in England. 
Abundance flowed down their streets ; fat ducks 
and poultry lay in piles in the market-place ; Chesh- 
ire cheese and butter barricaded the side-walks ; 
rosy farm-maidens, such as Edwin Landseer paints 
and " George Eliot " describes, stood bare-armed 
and bare-headed in the sun. How different these 
buxom English peasant girls, from the gaunt and 
care-worn market women that one sees in a Ger- 
man town ! In January, 1860, the statue of Lord 
Clive was erected in the Shrewsbury market-place, 
although Clive was born at Market-Drayton, not 
far distant, where his youthful exploit of climbing 
the church-steeple and sitting on the spout, is still 
fresh in the traditions of the people. 

The Severn River forms a bend around the city 
of Shrewsbury, and at this bend outside the walls 
there are meadows which have been left open as a 
public park ; and here, skirting the river, is " St. 
Chad's Walk," the most stately avenue of lime- 
trees in England. These trees were said to have 
been planted by one man in one day, nearly a 



16 OLD ENGLAND. 

century and a half ago, — another James Hillhouse 
in good taste and public spirit. Battlefield Church, 
on the spot where Falstaff fought his hour by 
Shrewsbury clock, is about four miles distant; I 
did not visit it, but am told that it stands desolate 
and neglected, the roof having tumbled in, and the 
nave being open to rain and weather. . But one 
tower of the ancient wall of Shrewsbury yet remains, 
though the elevated site of the town and its long 
line of old-fashioned buildings and steeples, still 
show picturesquely from the river. 1 

At Wolverhampton, on the London and Holy- 
head road, where one passes into Staffordshire, the 
scenery suddenly changes its character ; it is as if 
an invisible line were drawn between Paradise and 
Purgatory. Instead of the sweet clear sky, one 
rushes into an atmosphere like an oven's mouth ; 
and in the place of green and daisy-dropt fields, the 
ground becomes herbless and black, gloomy enough 
for Dora's pencil. Blast furnaces are vomiting 
smoke and flame ; the streams run darkness ; the 
sun glares raylessly and luridly through the simmer- 
ing gaseous air; men and women look begrimed, 

1 1 never could see the Severn, whether here in its modest youth, or 
near its mouth in its Amazonian greatness, without thinking of that 
old quatrain : — 

" The Avon to the Severn runs, 
The Severn to the sea : 
And Wiekliff's dust shall spread abroad 
Wide as the waters be." 

In 1425, WicklifPs body was exhumed by the order of the Bishop of 
Lincoln, burned, and the ashes thrown into the Swift, a little stream 
which emptied into the Avon. 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 17 

and smutchy-faced children play hide-and-seek 
through old burst engine-boilers; and the whole 
country around is strewn with heaps of shag, scoria, 
and the refuse matter of the blast furnaces. This 
represents a narrow streak of country across which 
the road passes, running from the neighborhood of 
Newport down to Worcester ; and there is also a 
much broader coal region that lies between Lich- 
field and Kidderminster. But in this " Black 
Country," notwithstanding its Tartarean aspect, 
the power of Old England couches herself like a 
dragon breathing flame and smoke, — the dragon 
that St. George of England (George Stephenson) 
has manfully subdued and hitched to the car of 
progress. 

The railway into Birmingham, in Warwick 
County, runs above the tops of an immense assem- 
blage of low, dingy brick houses with red-tiled 
roofs ; block after block, street after street, undis- 
tinguished by any architectural superiority the one 
over the other, are passed over ; the fragments of 
machinery strew the work-yards ; long factories 
are glided by ; sign-boards that seem to stretch the 
length of a train are spelled out word by word ; 
and at length one comes to a stand-still in the heart 
of the workshop of England, where John Bull has 
his sleeves rolled up, and a square paper-cap on 
his head. 

All things have an opportunity to prove them- 
selves in Birmingham ; and from the last invention 
in machinery to Dr. Newman's Catholic Convent, 



18 OLD ENGLAND. 

there is free and kindly soil for the theorist. Here 
John Angell James, like another aged " John," 
made this work-a-day world of Birmingham sacred 
with his apostolic presence. He was of that type 
of practical Christian men who force respect from 
all classes. His power lay in his moral energy ; but 
above all, there shone in his life that spirit of Chris- 
tian love, that takes the world into its embrace. 
I spoke of Dr. Newman. I had noticed a small 
portrait of him in a shop window, which I mistook 
for the likeness of Ralph Waldo Emerson ; and 
this awakened my curiosity to see his religious 
establishment ; so taking a seat in an Edgbaston 
omnibus, I was soon at Dr. Newman's conventual 
house, — an unsightly brick building not far out of 
the city, with a shabby little chapel attached to it, 
■ — any thing but the imposing ecclesiastical struct- 
ure one would have expected from a man of taste 
and a scholar. Inside of the chapel door was 
pasted this notice : " Plenary Indulgence to all the 
faithful who after confession and communion shall 
visit the chapel and pray for the intention of the 
Pope." There was certainly nothing to attract the 
faithful into this door ; — the whole affair was com- 
mon, flimsy, dirty, and cheap, with some faded pre- 
tensions to paint and splendor, and with a crude 
image of the Virgin that would have hardly satis- 
fied a third-rate Italian village church. If this be 
the chief instrumentality to convert England to the 
Catholic faith, it will probably fail ; but in saying 
this, I would say nothing against the amiable per- 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 19 

sonal character of Dr. Newman, and that spell of 
genius and power, with which he is said to attract 
all who come within the sphere of his personal in- 
fluence. 

I noticed in Birmingham, what I also noticed 
more especially in Liverpool and Manchester, and 
in some other cities whose greatness is of modern 
growth, that notwithstanding this fact, the city 
looks perfectly finished. Every thing is as com- 
plete and solid as if this life were to last forever. 
There is nothing more to be done. There is no 
gap to be filled, no pulling down and building up, 
as with us. We may be sure that the English 
would not be apt to pull down an old house like 
" the Hancock House," to make way for a modern 
building, though something of this sort has been 
done of late in London by the pressure of neces- 
sity. An old sign-board, half undecipherable, 
would be very likely to be left hanging for the sake 
of its past respectability. Whatever has stood the 
trial of time, has acquired in England preemption 
from change. Whatever is established, is con- 
cluded to be right, beautiful, and good. 

In the midst of the earnest life of this hard-work- 
ing city, at the exciting hour of high noon, when 
the busy human tide was greatest in the streets, I 
saw our lively little friend " Punch," in vigorous 
discussion with his worthy helpmate. An Eng- 
lish institution this ! The contracted brow was 
relaxed ; the quick step was arrested ; and the 
English love of fun and fighting broke out. High 



20 OLD ENGLAND. 

and low gathered around the small booth ; men 
with bars of iron upon their shoulders, carmen sit- 
ting sideways on their elephantine horses, clerks 
with their papers in their hands, all for the mo- 
ment forgot work, and even bank hours, and as 
they gazed roars of hearty laughter followed the 
fierce piping denunciations, and the determined 
thwacks of Mr. Punch. 

Although, going out from Leamington Spa as a 
centre, I visited Warwick, Kenilworth, and other 
well-known places, I cannot bring myself to speak 
of but one or two more of these places on the road 
to London. 

I have no intention to rhapsodize at the tomb of 
Shakspeare. When I visited it, there happened to 
be a great gathering of people in the church upon 
the occasion of instituting " The Bard of Avon 
Lodge of Free Masons ; " and it appeared to me to 
be a strange enough ceremony to occur in such a 
place as this. The Masonic Brotherhood, distin- 
guished by their dress and decorations, filled the 
body of the church. A young clergyman preached 
from the fifth chapter of Ezra, about rebuilding the 
old temple of true worship and of Christian broth- 
erhood in these godless and degenerate days. 
Though not one of the initiated, I joined in singing 
a hymn beginning thus : — 

" Great Architect of earth and heaven, 
By time nor space confined, 
Enlarge our love to comprehend 
Our Brethren, all mankind." 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 21 

One would think that better poetry than this 
might have been produced and sung in Shak- 
speare's church, and yet, after all, its expansive 
sentiment harmonized with the spirit of the place. 
An opportunity was given to contribute to the 
erection of a new painted window to the edifice, 
which will be something pleasant to think of here- 
after. 

While the religious services were progressing, a 
loud and unearthly shriek rang through the church. 
Such a singular interruption came from one of the 
side-aisles, where a poor tired woman had been 
suddenly seized with a fit. This event created 
considerable confusion, and it was indeed, for the 
moment, quite as startling as any of the poet's own 
weird scenes. 

In the heavy shadow of one of the ancient pil- 
lars, I noticed a very old man wearing a red vest, 
leaning on his crutch, with trembling head, bleared 
eyes, and long, tangled, white locks, seeming to be 
hardly conscious of what was taking place around 
him ; and here, I thought, truly was Shakspeare's 
Old Age. And, I could also see, just about me 
there in the motley crowd composed as they were 
of the poet's own towns-people, the burly magis- 
trate, the bearded soldier, the young man, or it 
may be lover, the school-boy, and the nursing babe. 
It was altogether like reading a leaf of the poet in 
the same daily and natural light in which it was 
written. 

How strange that after centuries of acquiescence 



22 OLD ENGLAND. 

in the authorship of Shakspeare's plays, a Yankee 
woman should be the first to challenge his claims. 
And now another fearless American has taken up 
the bold assertion. It is almost like attacking the 
authorship of a gospel. Though the arguments are 
ingenious the confidence of ages is not easily 
shaken. Homer is believed to have written the 
Iliad by the settled conviction of the world, founded 
on internal evidence as well as the testimony of 
history, although German criticism has exhausted 
its strength to overthrow the claim of the unity of 
its authorship. Above all, to add the fame of 
Shakspeare to that of Lord Bacon, were to " pile 
Ossa on Pelion." The world would groan under 
the weight. The testimony and friendship of Ben 
Jonson outweighs the envious assaults of a fellow- 
play-writer on him whom he smartly calls " the 
only Shake-scene in a countrey." That strange 
and incomprehensible impersonality which has al- 
ways been noticed in Shakspeare's writings, be- 
longs to the greatness and universality of his mind, 
not surely to the mere desire to conceal the author- 
ship of the most wonderful works of human genius. 
If Shakspeare could have written one of his plays, 
he could have written them all ; and his very great- 
ness seems to lift him serenely above doubt, or crit- 
icism, or discussion. But this is not the time or 
place to argue this matter. In what promises to 
be an exciting passage of arms, I am not now pre- 
pared to "shake a spear." Doubtless there will be 
a host of spears raised to sustain the falling heavens 
of Shakspeare's bright, immortal fame. 



LIVERPOOL TO LONDON. 23 

The next day after, I looked from the window 
of Elizabeth's room in the " Swan Tower " of Ken- 
il worth, over the region of what was once a part of 
the forest of Arden, the same region that gave the 
name to Shakspeare's mother, and where he laid 
the scene of that rich June poem, " As You Like 
It," — perhaps a poetic tribute to his mother, Mary 
Arden. 

At the Kenilworth railway station, there was 
gathered a rustic bridal party. The bride wore the 
invariable white ribbons and white veil, which 
English etiquette requires of brides high or low. 
I admired the honest sincerity of the scene, and the 
modest meekness with which the bride bore the 
smiles and pleasant remarks of all around. It was 
a half-triumphal and half-annoying ordeal. 

" 1 waited for the train at Coventry," 

and the " three tall spires " rising from the plain 
proved that the old town still belonged to the un- 
enchanted present, and is not yet spirited away into 
fairy land. One is more painfully reminded of this 
material present by the number of coarse modern 
liquor-shops that spot and infest this ancient city, 
as well as all other English cities and towms. In 
some smaller places, it is said that every fifth 
house is used for this purpose ; and by far the most 
elegant and ornamental shops in the kingdom are 
those which bear the staring signs of " Stout," 
" Wine," " Gin," " Brandy." The light wines of 
France and the Continent would be preferable to 
the strong liquors and soddening beers used univers- 



24 OLD ENGLAND. 

ally by the common people ; but it is quite doubtful 
whether the English will adopt these light wines 
to any extent, or, what is better, become soon an 
entirely temperate people. They will sog on until 
Mr. Gough, or that more eloquent speaker " Facts," 
converts them. But intelligent Englishmen are 
feeling deeply the force of these appalling facts in 
regard to the wide-spread and terrible ravages of 
intemperance. 

The antique interest of Coventry lies chiefly in 
the neighborhood of St. Michael's Church, and the 
more venerable St. Mary's Hall ; the first of these, 
with its towering spire of three hundred and three 
feet, is inferior only to the great cathedrals. This 
spire is a beautifully shaped octagon, supported by 
flying buttresses ; it pierces the sky like a wedge. 
St. Mary's Hall by its side takes us back to the 
days of the feudal " guilds " and pomps ; and it is a 
familiar fact that Coventry, even to this day, is a 
marvelous city for shows and pageants. Some of 
these, it is said, exhibit very odd and ludicrous 
mixtures of ancient helmets and modern beavers. 

The story of " Lady Godiva " meets you every- 
where. It is repeated in street statues, in archi- 
tectural ornaments, and upon shop sign-boards. 
But in these coarse and grotesque popular illustra- 
tions of the story, one cannot recognize the same 
legend as it shines in the hazy amber light of Ten- 
nyson's poetry, — the pure and delicate picture of 
her, who, for the love she bore the poor, 

" took the tax away, 
And built herself an everlasting name." 



CHAPTER II. 

LONDON. 

London, on the first visit, gave me little pleas- 
ure, and I was glad to leave it for the free, sweet, 
open country. It was overpowering. It was like 
going into the stifled breath of a furnace-mouth. 
Life is on so vast a scale, so terribly real, that one 
has little opportunity to think calmly, or play, or, I 
had almost said, pray. There is such an endless 
mass of human life that a man grows insignificant 
in his own eyes ; he loses his individuality ; he is in- 
clined to cry, " I am a mere bubble — a speck — on 
this immense sea of existence ! I am worthless and 
insignificant in the eye of God ! " I know this 
feeling is foolish, especially to a genuine Londoner, 
than whom no one enjoys life more heartily. An 
English gentleman, to whom I expressed some such 
sentiment, remarked that one must be a difficult 
person to please if he could not live comfortably at 
the West End of London ! A second visit, and 
agreeable lodgings in clean and handsome St. 
James' Street, gave me a far more cheerful impres- 
sion of London life. Many London families, in the 
summer time, I was told, are in the habit of renting 
their houses or apartments, with all their furniture 



26 OLD ENGLAND. 

and table-service, while they spend the warm 
weather in the country or on the Continent. Thus 
there may be seen "Lodgings to let" in the best 
streets of London, and sometimes on very fine 
houses, reminding one of Ben Jonson's " Alche- 
mist," and showing how English fashions do not 
change. To take lodgings in some neat and com- 
fortable quarter at the West End, is by far the 
pleasantest way of spending a short time in Lon- 
don. 

The tranquil, free, and wide-spread parks of Lon- 
don, yield one also at any time an escape from the 
surging current of life that rolls through the streets, 
— the countless trains of omnibuses, carts, car- 
riages, men, women, and children. To slip into 
St. James' Park by the side of the dingy old palace, 
you are at once removed from the presence of the 
heated and roaring city, and enjoying the pure air 
and quiet freshness of Nature. The sudden con- 
trast is the more refreshing. 

One of the most delightful spots in London is the 
" Botanic Garden " in Regent's Park, at the height 
of the season of flowers. Here you may see gath- 
ered the beauty and aristocracy of the city. Yet 
you cannot but be struck by the fact, that when 
crowds of the best and noblest London families are 
brought together in an afternoon promenade con- 
cert, few of these beautiful women and elegant men 
seem to be acquainted with each other. They are 
silent and unsocial. There appears to be, to a 
stranger, an icy reserve among the English toward 



LONDON. 27 

each other, which all summer heats and the soft 
breath of flowers cannot quite melt. The London 
exhibitions of American shrubs, of such shrubs as 
our wild azaleas and rhododendrons, brought by 
skillful cultivation to great beauty and size, are 
well worth seeing. Few know the vast pains and 
expense taken in England, to send botanists to 
every part of the world, and especially into new 
countries, to collect every foreign species of tree, 
plant, and flower. Even as far back as two centu- 
ries ago, this painful and costly process was going 
on. Our American maple-leaved hawthorn was 
then introduced into England. The cedar and 
larch were brought in a little earlier, and the mul- 
berry in the reign of James I. The native of every 
land on the globe may thus see with delight, in the 
public gardens of England, his own familiar home 
plants and flowers, and scent the breath as it were 
of his own hills and plains. 

The literary man, too, finds London his paradise. 
The cosy book-shops about St. Paul's Churchyard, 
and other snug grazing fields, are places too tempt- 
ing for any but literary nabobs, or for that insa- 
tiable hunter of books, Dr. Cogswell, to revel in. 
Every thing golden in antique or modern let- 
ters drops at last into these half-hidden but pro- 
found treasure-houses. When I was in London, 
many of Mr. Mitford's most precious books, with 
his neatly written and valuable marginal notes, 
could be purchased. Those russet-covered vol- 
umes haunt the imagination, long after the poor lit- 



28 OLD ENGLAND. 

erary epicure has come back to his small study and 
slender oat-meal. Mr. Mitford's books sold very 
cheap. A Scaliger copy of a valuable Greek au- 
thor, rich in historic annotations, was bought for 
£1 Is. An Aldine Catullus, with four hundred 
notes by Professor Porson, was purchased for 
<£3 6s. 

As a central point to see London, half an hour 
spent on one of the bridges will enable a person to 
impress some feeble picture of the mighty city on 
his mind, and to take a sweep up and down the 
almost unimaginable extent of London. Words- 
worth's sonnet on Westminster Bridge at morning, 
showed that he had a human heart, which some 
have denied him : 

" Earth hath not any thing more fair ; 
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by 
A sight so touching in its majesty. 
The city now doth like a garment wear 
The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare, 
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie, 
Open unto the fields and to the sky, 
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. 
Never did sun more beautifully steep 
In his first splendor, valley, rock, and hill ; 
Ne'er saw I, never felt a calm so deep ! 
Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ; 
And all that mighty heart is lying still ! " 

The poet was fortunate to see the city in this 
" smokeless air." A London fog has often been 
described, but rarely exaggerated. That yellow 
gloom, that " darkness that could be felt," rolling 
into the innermost chamber of the house, and cast- 
ing a haze about the friend who sits in the opposite 



LONDON. 29 

corner, can hardly be overdrawn. And yet three 
miles from the city, at the same point of time, it 
may be bright and clear. Another thought of 
quite justifiable pride cannot but occur to an Amer- 
ican looking at the river Thames, and that is, the 
vast superiority of New York to London in its site 
as a commercial metropolis. The Thames toward 
its mouth is a broad river it is true, but how won- 
derful is the harbor of New York, with two deep 
arms of the sea on either side, and the magnificent 
bay spreading out in front ! 

There is a great source of historic fact and in- 
terest not always explored in the London churches. 
Take, for instance, St. Giles' Church, Cripplegate ; 
this is in an out-of-the-way corner of the old city, 
near Grub Street, where poor authors once starved. 
In this church is the tomb of Milton. There is a 
marble bust of him over the spot where he was 
buried. It represents his face in old age, meagre 
and deeply lined, like his picture in Pickering's 
edition of Milton's Works. Here also is the tomb 
of Fox, the martyrologist. There is an inscription 
in this church upon the monument of a young noble 
lady, that was so simple and beautiful that I copied 
it. " Here lies Margaret Lucy, the second daugh- 
ter of Sr. Thomas Lucy of Charelcote, in the 
county of Warwick, Knight, (the third by immedi- 
ate descent of y name of Thomas), by Alice sole 
daughter and heire of Thomas Spencer, of Clareden, 
in the same county, Esqr. and Gustos Brevium of 
the Courte of Comon Pleas at Westminster, who 



30 OLD ENGLAND. 

departed this life the 18th day of November 1634, 
and aboute the 19th yeare of her age ; for discretion 
and sweetnesse of conversation not many excelled, 
and for pietie and patience in her sicknesse and 
death few equalled her : which is the comforte of 
her neerest friendes, to every one of whom she was 
very deare, but especialie to her old grandmother, 
the Lady Constance Lucy, under whose government 
shee died ; who having exspected every day to have 
gone before her, doth now trust by faith, and hope 
in the precious bloode of Christ Jesus, shortly to 
follow after, and be partaker with her and others, 
of the unspeakable and eternal joyes in his blessed 
kingdom ; to whom be all honor laude and praise, 
now and ever, Amen." 

In the yard of the same old half-hidden black 
brick church, is to be seen a bastion of the Roman 
wall. The obliging and intelligent sexton of " St. 
Giles," was the only official that I remember in 
England who refused a fee. " St. Pancras in the 
Fields" was the last church in England whose bell 
rung for mass. On the register of " St. Martin's 
in the Fields," Lord Bacon's baptism is recorded. 
In one of these old London churches, Cromwell 
was married. Miles Coverdale was buried in " St. 
Bartholomew's." " Shoreditch Church " was built 
over the spot where Jane Shore died in a ditch from 
starvation. What is now " Finsbury Circus" was 
then about the limit of the city in that direction. 

All English history, law, literature, religion, have 
met in London, and have radiated from London 
as a common centre. 



LONDON. 31 

With the aid of Murray here and there, the 
following may be mentioned as a few such points 
in London, touched by the presence of great men 
and events. In the neighborhood of the Islington 
suburb, was the scene of Suetonius' victory over 
Boadicea, in which 80,000 Britons were slain. 
Where " Barclay's Brewery " in Southwark stands, 
the " Globe Theatre " stood, and Master William 
Shakspeare played his own dramas and " suited the 
action to the word." At this spot also General 
Haynau was well drubbed by the sturdy brewers. 
In Bethnall Green, still live the descendants of the 
French silk-weavers who fled to England after the 
massacre of St. Bartholomew. Milton's father re- 
sided in Bread Street, Cheapside ; and in this street 
the poet was born. He was a true Cockney born 
within the " sound of Bow Bells." The same 
" Cheapside " it is, whose stones did rattle with the 
" chaise and four," and the precious burden of — 

" My sister and my sister's child, 
Myself and children three." 

At Cheapside, Tyndale's English translation of the 
Bible was burned in 1526. Goldsmith died at No. 
2 Brick Court Temple. Benjamin Franklin lived 
at No. 7 Craven Street, Strand. Handel lived in 
Piccadilly. In King Street, Edmund Spenser died 
for " lack of bread." Here also Louis Napoleon 
lived when he acted policeman; and rumor says, 
he believes it is his destiny to die at Cheapside. 
Lord Byron was born in a boarding-house on 
Cavendish Square. Samuel Rogers' house was No. 



32 OLD ENGLAND. 

22 St. James Place. William Turner was born in 
1775 at 26 Maiden Lane, near Covent Garden. 
In the Inns of Temple Court, the memories of 
Goldsmith, Johnson, Mansfield, Eldon, are still 
fresh. In Whitehall Chapel one sees the window 
out of which Charles I. stepped to his execution. 
In the centre of Lincoln's Inn Fields, Lord John 
Russell was beheaded. Every one knows of that 
vast cemetery of Bunhill Fields near Finsbury 
Square, where the best genius and piety of the 
old dissenters found rest from their labors. 

In Smithfield Market the martyrs of the Marian 
persecution were burned, and William Wallace was 
beheaded. Here also King Richard III. had his 
encounter with Wat Tyler. Would one ask for 
the burial-place of Cromwell? His body was dis- 
interred and burned under Tyburn gallows, in the 
new part of London now called " Tyburnia," and 
the most aristocratic portion of the city. On 
Temple Bar, which must soon come down like 
a rock in the middle of a busy river, the heads of 
traitors were hung. At Guildhall one may still 
see " Gog and Magog " in all their bearded majesty, 
in spite of Mr. Punch. One of the most intensely 
interesting places in London is Christ's Hospital, 
founded by pious Edward VI. for fatherless children 
and foundlings. This is the famous " Blue Coat 
School." I was told that there were eight hundred 
now belonging to the school. Here Stillingfleet, 
Richardson, Lamb, Leigh Hunt, and " the inspired 
charity boy," Coleridge, went to school. A frisky 



LONDON. 33 

herd of boys just let out careered through the yard 
in front of the hall bare-headed, many of them 
with their long blue coats tied up around them in 
front, and their spindle shanks and yellow stockings 
making a great display. 

I visited a spot where the memory of one " gentle " 
spirit still lingers, and makes the most unromantic 
place in the world attractive. Set down in front 
of a sombre row of columns, and a low dingy pile 
of buildings, one could hardly conceive that this 
was the seat of that company of merchants who 
once ruled a vast empire with absolute sway, — the 
East India House in Leadenhall Street. An apart- 
ment up one flight of stairs toward the back of the 
building, was where Charles Lamb used to write. 
There I was introduced to a courteous white-haired 
gentleman, who told me (though I know nothing 
more of him) that he was a fellow-clerk with Lamb, 
and occupied the next desk to his. He showed the 
place where Lamb's desk stood, under a window 
which looked out on the blank brick wall of a house. 
He spoke of him whom he was proud to call a friend, 
with enthusiasm. He said he was the best-hearted 
man in the world. Sometimes he would say to him, 
" Now you, who live in the country, go and spend 
a day at home with your family, and I will take 
care of your books." He had tremendous fits of 
work, and would accomplish three men's tasks in a 
day. At other times he would keep them all merry 
with his stories, and fill his pages with the oddest 
scrawls and etchings. This called to mind Lamb's 



34 OLD ENGLAND. 

boyish delight, which he speaks of in one of his 
letters, when he had learned to make " flourishes " 
and (poor Elia) " corkscrews, the best he ever 
drew." Among other pleasant things and sayings 
which this old gentleman related, I recall but this : 
" One day a wealthy London merchant was ushered 
into the room, and introduced to Lamb as ' Mr. 
So-and-So, a distinguished spice merchant.' ' Oh 
yes,' said Lamb, quick as lightning, ' I 'm happy 
to see you, sir ; I smelt you coming.' " 

The India House Library forms a rich and splen- 
did collection of some 24,000 Oriental works, 8000 
of these being still in manuscript. Among them 
is the famous " Koran," copied on vellum by the 
Caliph Othman III. a. d. 655. 

Let us now turn to quite another theme and 
quarter of the city, and glance at the English 
" House of Commons." 

Ascending the noble staircase leading up from 
old " Westminster Hall," one passes into an ave- 
nue or corridor, connecting with the new " Houses 
of Parliament." This superb avenue is called " St. 
Stephen's Hall." Along its sides are ranged full- 
length statues of Hampden, Falkland, Selden, 
Chatham, Burke, Pitt, Fox, and others of the 
great Commoners of England. This hall leads 
into a vestibule highly decorated and gilded, by 
which one enters immediately into the " House of 
Commons " on the one side, and the " House of 
Lords " on the other. Let us enter the House of 
Commons. We go up a flight of stairs, and seat 



LONDON. 35 

ourselves in what is named the " Reporters' Gal- 
lery." Opposite us are the reporters' desks, at 
which you see anxious-looking men seated, w T ho, 
after writing a little time with intense application, 
get up and go out, being relieved of their severe 
toil by others. The House of Commons is almost 
as gorgeous as wrought gold, fine brass, oak-wood 
carving, rich frescoes, and stained-glass windows 
can make it. I say " almost," for the House of 
Lords, though of the same general architectural 
character, is still more elaborate in its finish and 
ornament. It blazes in crimson and gold. 

After having looked around and above, and 
sated our eyes with richness, and studied out the 
Tudor rose and portcullis ornaments, and other 
historic emblems, then look down and see what 
this magnificent house of the gods contains. Are 
they gods or men ? They are truly but men ; and 
they are men who all wear their hats on as at a 
Quaker meeting. But it is no Quaker meeting ; 
for the spirit of heavenly repose which broods over 
the assemblies of the saints, is not surely here. 
There is an anxious, angry, almost fierce spirit of 
debate and conflict. The only unexcited counte- 
nance is that of the Speaker, who, profoundly 
buried in his big gray wig, sits imperturbable as a 
machine, or rises at long intervals to put a vote in 
the shortest and driest manner. 

It is odd to see the quiet, matter-of-fact way in 
which vast money-bills are voted upon and disposed 
of in the English Parliament. I heard money 



36 OLD ENGLAND. 

enough to set up a small government appropriated 
in about five minutes, all the members voting in 
favor of it, though there had been a protracted and 
violent debate upon it, in which it seemed as if the 
tottering government must give way. The real 
business goes on by machinery. Discussion is like 
a dance on the mill-floor while the great wheel goes 
steadily round. The cold, firm will of the govern- 
ing class, sovereign in the House of Commons as in 
the House of Lords, allowing little possibility of pop- 
ular interference, manages every thing in its own 
way. A long, green table stands in the centre of 
the room, at one end of which two bewigged clerks 
are seated, and at the other end hangs the ponder- 
ous " mace." The Government party occupy 
seats on one side of this table, and the Opposition 
on the other. 

There is an impression now prevailing in Eng- 
land, that the business of the nation has become so 
gigantic and complicated that Parliament is really 
not equal to its transaction. I have certainly 
rarely seen a more wearied and fagged-out set of 
men than the Government bench at that time pre- 
sented. The brilliant gas-light streamed down on 
care-worn, haggard faces. They were then, it is 
true, in a state of siege, and brought by a powerful 
and unrelenting opposition into the most desperate 
condition. Lord Palmerston, however, carried a 
bold air. In the broad and racy expression of his 
face he looked the born Irishman. He seemed to 
have the elasticity of immortal youth. It was 



LONDON. 37 

highly interesting to hear this inimitable veteran 
debater roll off his easy and stereotyped phrases of 
defense, now rising into stately rhetoric, now get- 
ting up an immense indignation, now casting him- 
self back on his official dignity, and now darting a 
fatal thrust of mingled ridicule and power into the 
weak place of his opponent's harness. His vener- 
able compeer, Lord John Russell, has a pompous 
way of speaking for a small man, but is ingenious 
in gliding oilily around a difficulty ; and when he 
cannot answer it, has an imperious way of tramp- 
ling it down. It was wonderful to see these old 
men sustaining these severe midnight debates ; for 
the sessions of Parliament begin at five or six in 
the evening, and last sometimes until three o'clock 
in the morning. 

Confessedly the most polished and fluent speaker 
in Parliament is Mr. Gladstone ; but, as a rough 
Englishman said to me, " He is too eloquent to be 
honest ; " not that this is literally true, but with 
English people too great facility is looked upon 
with suspicion. I was fortunate to hear Mr. Bright 
speak, although but briefly. He has a round, full 
forehead, and a large, resolute mouth, but the ex- 
pression seemed to me gentler and more refined 
than I had imagined of this strong popular tribune. 
He looks like a good man — a man whose heart, 
whose moral nature, predominates over and sub- 
ordinates his intellect. You get just the reverse of 
this idea, I think, from the face of Gladstone, who 
is pure intellect, though he has shown that he pos- 



38 OLD ENGLAND. 

sesses a noble heart. Bright's speech was charac- 
terized by straightforward plainness, and also by- 
singular force of condensed scholarly expression. 
There was none of the drawling mannerism of 
the other speakers, but a marching right on in 
a free, fresh, direct current of remark. There 
seemed to me a consciousness that he was the 
leader of a growing power in the State, and was 
bound to say something " telling " and strong. 
He stands on his own legs, and not on pre- 
scriptive reputation, opinions, or policies. He is at 
this moment the grandest figure, the foremost man 
in England. He seemed to me, morally, to tower 
immeasurably above all the nobles and distinguished 
men about him. He is indeed a dangerous man. 
He goes rather too fast for John Bull. " Still," as 
one of my English friends said to me, " England 
will and must have substantial reforms, it matters 
not what minister may be in power." The most 
striking-looking man in the House of Commons is 
Disraeli. I did not hear him speak. His head, 
from the distance where I sat, appeared not un- 
like Webster's, though of far less massive mould ; 
perhaps it was his saturnine complexion and im- 
perturbable countenance that gave me this impres- 
sion. His dark features and black hair, his con- 
templative and even sombre expression, single him 
out among all. He is a stranger there. Although 
his spirit may not be wholesome, and his eloquence 
is often more brilliant than sound, he has dared 
to rise above the dead level practical standard of 



LONDON. 89 

English debate into a new world of ideas and prin- 
ciples, and to discuss subjects in a more comprehen- 
sive and philosophical way. The best speech I 
heard on the whole, for its vigorous English and 
manly thought, was from Sir T. Baring. Judge 
Haliburton (Sam Slick) delivered a long, gossip- 
ing discourse with no particular point. With no 
lack of point was Mr. Roebuck's attack on the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer. He speaks deliber- 
ately and in a low voice, but with that distinct 
whisper, or hissing tone, that makes every word 
tell. His keen shafts, drawn firmly to the head, 
are sent twanging home with no reservation of 
human feebleness or pity. Chaucer must have 
written prophetically of him : 

" The arwes of thy crabbed eloquence 
Shall perce his crest and eke his aventayle." 

Although seated on the lower tier of benches oppo- 
site the reporters' desks, it was some time before I 
could begin to understand a word that was said. 
The thick articulation, and the broken, jerking way 
of speaking, made the English language sound like 
another tongue. Even Lord Palmerston at times 
got floundering and gasping in a painfully pro- 
longed course of barren " eh-eh-eh's." 

In the House of Lords, the dull and drawling 
style of oratory was still more pronounced. Lords 
Normanby, Clanricarde, Waters, De Canning, 
Brougham, and others spoke. Some of the 
noble lords actually went to sleep with folded 
arms beneath their broad-brimmed hats. Lord 
Brougham has siill the lionlike look and the 



40 OLD ENGLAND. 

energetic sweep of the arm ; but the silver hair, 
bent back, and, above all, failing voice, tell of the 
decay of physical force. In the remarks that he 
made there was no lack of mental vigor, and 
of downright crashing common sense. He made 
the impression of greater genuine oratorical power 
than any speaker whom I heard in England, 
though it was power on the wane, and the old fire 
but faint. Sir Stratford de Canning, who has done 
a great work as a diplomatist, wielding the influ- 
ence of England on the side of humanity and Chris- 
tian civilization, is certainly no speaker, judging by 
the effort which I heard. His place is not in the 
stirring field of debate. He delivered an elaborate 
speech that read remarkably well the next morning 
in the " Times," but he nearly broke down twice 
in doing it. 

The best way for a young man to see London, 
is to take " Cruchley's Map of London," which 
has references to more than six hundred streets, 
squares, and public places, and which distinctly 
denotes what buildings and institutions are wor- 
thy of being visited on both sides of every street, 
and then to see London by walking. In this way 
he is independent of valets and cabmen, loses 
nothing that is memorable, and gains some, it may 
be tiresome, personal experience of the incredible 
vastness of the city. 

An American need not be reminded to visit 
Westminster Abbey, the Tower, St. Paul's Cathe- 
dral, the National Gallery, and the British Mu- 
seum. His national instincts will probably lead 



LONDON. 41 

him to the Bank of England in Threadneedle 
Street. The British Museum comprehends a 
square in the heart of London. To go through it 
is like walking through the avenues of a dead 
world. It is a pleasant toil, but toil it certainly is. 
By going day after day, or rather week after week, 
it may be slowly conquered. When in visiting 
Athens I saw the holes in the frieze of the Parthe- 
non out of which the Elgin marbles had been torn, 
it was with a feeling of indignation and sorrow ; 
but as one reflects that it was by this means that 
the sculptures were probably saved from the de- 
struction of war, or from being ground into lime by 
the Turks, and that they have been the instrumen- 
tality of regenerating modern Art, he is reconciled 
to the change ; and perhaps, hereafter, when 
Greece becomes a nation worthy of the name, 
some " Great Eastern " will transport the marbles 
back again, and they will take their old place in 
the entablature of the temple. In passing the case 
that contains the " Codex Alexandrinus," one is 
inclined, like my genial and accomplished friend 
Mr. Henry Stevens, the librarian of the American 
department of the library — to take off his hat. 
This version, according to Cyril Lucar, Patriarch 
of Alexandria, was copied by an Egyptian woman 
named Thecla, in the fourth century ; and it bears 
evident marks of female chirography. Tischendorff 
and other modern scholars, however, assign it to 
the fifth century. It stands next in value after the 
Vatican and Sinaitic versions. It was a gift from 
Cyril to Charles I., in 1629. 



CHAPTER HI. 

LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 

Art in London has been derided by those 
who live on the Continent, and nothing beauti- 
ful is thought capable of blossoming in that foggy 
atmosphere. It is true that Nelson's monument 
in Trafalgar Square does not permit Nelson to 
be seen ; and Wellington's statue at Hyde Park 
is the ideal of military " old fogyism ; " and all 
the " pleasant singers " are Italians ; and many 
of the metropolitan sculptors and builders have 
foreign names ; yet, in spite of all, London is one 
of the world's art-centres. It would be too great 
a task to discuss English Art as developed in the 
numberless schools, galleries, and expositions of 
London. Between three and four thousand new 
pictures are annually on exhibition. Who can say 
that English Art is doing nothing ? Perhaps no- 
where in the world is there so much done, to 
judge by the quantity, and in some respects the 
quality, of the fruits. There has been an impor- 
tant revolution in English Art, as every one knows, 
since the days of Reynolds, Wilson, Romney, and 
Gainsborough. In some respects it has lost, but 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 43 

in others gained, power. The trials of Wilkie, 
the agonies of Haydon, and above all the eccentric 
but inspired studies of Turner, have produced de- 
cided changes. English Art has gained in natural 
vigor, and in truthfulness of drawing and detail, 
what it has lost in ideal power. It is a good thing 
to go back to Nature, and copy even her stones 
correctly ; this lays a foundation for genius to build 
upon. Pre-Raphaelitism is already giving over its 
minute realness, and beginning to clothe its lean- 
ness with the beauty of life and of higher truth. 
It has done good; but it has not proved that 
those things which God has made small and 
earthly are as beautiful as those he has made 
great and heavenly. " There are glories terres- 
trial and glories celestial." Purity is not sufficient 
for greatness, or a little child would be morally 
greater than a tried and victorious man. Passion, 
ideality, the divine life, must breathe and glow in 
every truly great work of Art. I am Ruskinite 
enough to think that Turner, in his best style, was 
as near an approach to the great English painter 
as has yet been made. " But after my words they 
spake not," said Job ; and who wishes to enter 
into an elaborate discussion of Turner after the 
Oxford oracle has spoken. Turner did a great 
work, if it were only to have been the occasion 
of Ruskin's marvelous eloquence. One has a per- 
fect right, however, to look, and see, and judge 
whether he likes or dislikes Turner's paintings. 
There was, when I was in London, a fine oppor- 



44 OLD ENGLAND. 

tunity to do this at the Kensington Museum, popu- 
larly the '■ Boilers," where there were three large 
rooms full of Turner's best and worst pictures, 
arranged it is said by Mr. Ruskin himself. What 
impressed me most in Turner's greatest pictures, 
those which belong principally to his second and 
sound style, was their imaginative power. In such 
paintings as " Dido building Carthage," in the 
National Gallery, and the " Shipwreck," and 
" Ulysses deriding Polyphemus," and " The Fight- 
ing Temeraire tugged to her last Berth " — (who 
gave these taking titles.? 1 ) and " Childe Harold's 
Pilgrimage," say what you will about their " light " 
and "atmosphere," their "depth" and "aerial 
perspective," it is the power that brings before you 
new things, that calls them up from the pure realm 
of imagination, — it is this poetic power that gives 
the charm to these pictures. They awake the 
sense of the infinite that a great poem does. They 
take down the bars and let you into the green 
fields of joy and freedom. One has the feeling — 
(always a delightful one) — that the author of 
these pictures could do any thing he wished, could 
build a Carthage or a Rome. 

As I was looking at one of those sublime scrawls 
before which the real votary of Turner is drunk 
with frenzy, a plain farmer's wife came in and read 

1 Since writing the above I have seen it expressly stated in 
Thornbury's biography of Turner, that the name of " The Fighting 
T^me'raire," and the names of others of his pictures, were Mr. Tur- 
ner's own titles. Turner was a poet, though he wrote but poor poetry, 
His poems were his pictures. 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 45 

the title, " The Day after the Deluge." " Wull ! 
I should think it wur ! " was the only remark she 
made ; and then she walked through the room 
without noticing another picture. 

That there is any thing in these later fantasies 
of Turner's brain which appeals to the universal 
understanding and common sentiment of beauty, 
I cannot suppose ; though, for expressing this opin- 
ion, an Englishman almost told me that there was 
a want of appreciation in myself. And he added, 
moreover, that these last pictures of Turner com- 
manded better prices than his earlier ones. I 
pitied him as too far gone to be saved. Looked 
at as unfinished sketches, or dashing experiments 
in color, or studies of the concentration of light, 
they are artistically interesting, and some of them 
have a confused grandeur, as the sketches of " A 
Fire at Sea," and " The Deluge." But to call 
the " Angel standing in the Sun," and " Rain, 
Steam, and Speed," and " Hannibal crossing the 
Alps," and the various spotty reflexes of " Venice," 
true pictures of Nature, or of a healthy imagina- 
tion, this were like calling Carlyle's worst style 
pure English. They have no regard to form or 
fact. They are but dashes, streaks of pigment. 
Take the picture called " Tapping the Furnace ; " 
there is no furnace, nor bell, nor workshop, nor 
any thing that particularizes such a scene, but it 
is a universal explosion of high colors. Yet before 
Turner's finished pictures, radiant with truthful 
splendors, full of the movement of life, boldly fol- 



46 OLD ENGLAND. 

lowing Nature and catching her deepest expres- 
sions, honestly regardful of fact, painting, as he 
gruffly declared, " his clouds from the clouds in the 
sky — how else would you paint them ? '■ — but 
despising the minute and the dull, we may rever- 
ently bow. His coloring, as well as drawing, is 
inspired by one living impulse ; that is, it is paint- 
ed from the momentary pregnant suggestion, and, 
as it were, flash of Nature. This shows the great 
painter whose coloring is not the result of elaborate 
work in the study, but the inspiration of living 
truth. We had rather see mistakes in such great 
and original pictures, than the most careful per- 
fection of execution in common works. 

" Landscape painting," De Quincey said, " is 
the peculiar product of Christianity ; " and it is 
certain that the most Christian nation delights in 
landscape painting. The walls of its galleries are 
not hung with huge historic scenes and battle 
pieces, as those of France ; or with ideal paintings 
of heathen poetry and religion, as of Italy; but 
with tranquil views of beautiful English nature, 
lighted by some simple sentiment or home affec- 
tion. The historical style is having its commence- 
ment in England. Such powerful painters as 
Maclise and Ward, prove that England need go 
no more to the Rubenses and Van Dycks of other 
countries to illuminate her story. But let a man 
wander over England, walk from one northern 
lake to another through the whole string of pearls, 
climb the mountains of Wales, explore the lonely 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 47 

coves and rocks of Cornwall, roam through the 
ferny combes of Devonshire, and over the smooth 
downs of Kent and Surrey, sit in thatched cot- 
tages, linger in the solemn shades of old cathedral 
towns, and then let him go' into the Fall Exhibi- 
tions of Art in London, and he will see it all over 
again, and will almost know the very rocks and 
meadows, houses and hay-ricks, in the pictures. 
He must have dined with more than one of those 
artists, an angel unawares. One is willing to say, 
" Let High Art go to the sepulchres of Ossian's 
heroes ! " when enjoying these delightful pictures 
of Nature, that draw the thorn from the careworn 
mind. And if one wishes for power, vastness, 
agitation, terror, he has it in the sea and storm 
pieces, that no artist loves more, or has a better 
opportunity to delineate, than he who lives in an 
island which is the home of tempests, and on 
whose thousand bold headlands the ocean perpet- 
ually thunders. Turner painted a snow-storm off 
the coast of England, in which his own life was 
imperilled. 

English Art has of late years, as every one 
knows, run much into the representation of pure 
animal life. Animal life has been strangely lifted 
into the sphere of sentiment and poetry. We do 
not see merely Paul Potter's bellowing " bull 
and cows," but we see a reflex of human traits, 
whether noble or mean, in the rough faces and 
mute actions of the creatures made for man. It 
is a fine Christian recognition of the hidden links 



48 OLD ENGLAND. 

of being, and of the love of God in his plan of 
creation. Yet this idea may be overstrained, as 
in Landseer's picture of a " Highland Deluge," 
exhibited in the " Royal Academy." A dying 
cow is made the heroine of that tragedy, of which 
a whole Highland family are but subordinate feat- 
ures. Our pity is turned into contempt, on the 
principle of Jonathan Edwards' definition of vir- 
tue, — that it is " love to being in general," but 
graduated in strict accordance to its standard of 
worth. We are inclined to give the palm to 
Rosa Bonheur over Edwin Landseer. The last 
paints wonderful pictures, the first living animals. 
We heartily believe the story that Rosa Bonheur 
lives with her animals, and does not shun the 
reeking shambles and abattoirs, to study the psy- 
chology of her dumb favorites. She evidently 
loves them, and does not paint for money or rep- 
utation, but to express her affection for animals, 
and to embalm the memory of her friends and 
heroes. 

The American will be glad to see in the 
" British School " not only the most famous 
paintings of West, grand though cold, but some 
of Gilbert Stuart's lifelike portraits ; and many 
of Leslie's works, who, born in England, was of 
American parentage, and resided for a time in 
America. He was, moreover, a student of Wash- 
ington Allston. There is clearness and bright- 
ness in his coloring, and an air of sunny life 
about his pictures. He is not a great painter, 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 49 

but no one has caught the airy spirit of Shak- 
speare's comedy and Cervantes' humor better than 
he. " Don Quixote reproving the Ecclesiastic," 
in the British Institution, is not a coarse carica- 
ture of the brave knight, but it revels in the ludi- 
crous points and contrasts of the scene, the flaming 
indignation of the demented hero, the red-hot, 
roaring, stamping rage of the fat priest, the Count 
holding a hard battle between mirth and Castilian 
dignity, the beautiful Countess really more inter- 
ested for the Don than struck with the comical 
aspect of things, and the unconquerable gravity 
of the Spanish attendants. The illustrious Gov- 
ernor of Barataria, last but not least, lives again 
in Leslie's paintings. Still it must be said that 
Leslie did not work a deep vein. 

The " Bridgewater Collection " is rich in Italian 
and Flemish pictures. Three exquisite Raphaels 
would seem to be enough for one collection. The 
masterpiece of Gerard Dow is there. There are 
also two powerful landscapes by Richard Wilson. 

To England belongs the glory of painting in 
water-colors. It may be called an English art. 
Turner himself was one of its originators, or 
rather reformers. He introduced the new system 
of employing local tints, and of shading each 
object with its own tint, instead of laying on first 
a formal groundwork of India ink, or some neu- 
tral monotone, and tinting it afterward. The 
present system lends freedom and brilliancy to the 
painting. It is like genuine oil painting. Colors 



50 OLD ENGLAND. 

are intermingled as in Nature, and there is a pecu- 
liar transparency and vividness that oil-colors do 
not give. 

I do not know a more refreshing and pleasing 
place to spend an hour, than an Exhibition of 
English Water-color paintings. Every hue of 
water, earth, and sky is flung around. Fancy 
plays endless freaks. The subjects are as various 
as the expressions and wantonness of Nature. 

The delicate fineness of Birket Poster's land- 
scapes equals the exquisiteness of a camera 6b- 
scurd. Almost every individual flower and grass- 
spire upon a natural bank or meadow, flourishes 
in his little cabinet pieces. There is a gem-like 
light on them. This kind of painting is better 
fitted for landscapes than for "genre" pictures. 
And one is surprised to see the boldness and power 
often thrown into these small paintings. The 
gloomy " Pass of Glencoe " with its frowning 
walls of misty mountains, or a deep black Welsh 
tarn, or broken coast scenery, or the ocean torn 
by a winter tempest, are scenes that these artists 
do not shrink from. But to catch the bright 
sparkle of English summer fields, or the green and 
golden gleam of an autumn corn-field, or to invade 
the cool home of the shy lilies, or to paint a pink- 
cheeked Dutch family of squat mushrooms and a 
group of blue-bells and buttercups, or to give a 
gleam of the portentous harvest moon silvering an 
old castle with a broad-winged bird of night flying 
athwart its face, is more to the taste of these 
bright-fancied playful artists. 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 51 

Holman Hunt's picture of the " Finding of 
Christ in the Temple," has created much contro- 
versy. Though learned and marvelously elab- 
orate, it will not establish the superiority of the 
Pre-Raphaelite school in the higher elements of 
the art. It wants unity and elevation. I have 
seen just such dull, blear-eyed Rabbis in Jerusa- 
lem, representing the utmost fall and degradation 
of modern Judaism, but certainly not representing 
the proud and philosophic princes of the old Jewish 
hierarchy of our Lord's time. The Saviour is rep- 
resented as a youth of genius, with blue Saxon 
eyes and bright auburn hair ; there is nothing Ori- 
ental, or what is infinitely more, Divine, in his face. 
But I will say no more of Art here, for it is a 
subject upon which every one thinks that he knows 
more than others, and therefore is disposed to treat 
what others say with contempt. 

While in London I heard Charles Spurgeon 
preach twice, and saw the power this apostle of 
modern Babylon exerted upon the masses of the 
people. He has the prime quality of great preach- 
ers, that he speaks to the popular mind ; and " the 
common people heard him gladly." There he 
bends his efforts, and there he shows his greatness, 
and his resemblance to his Master. I heard Spur- 
geon several times afterward in Paris, and prob- 
ably he then preached with more than usual care 
in the arrangement and style of his sermons, 
though they may for that very reason have lost 
something of their rough popular power. I will 



52 OLD ENGLAND. 

give the impression his preaching then made upon 
me, with the simple addition that it fails to convey 
a full idea of his free, homely, and often coarse 
illustration. I would apologize for the particularity 
of the description, but it may serve to correct some 
false popular notions of this preacher. 

Mr. Spurgeon preached his first sermon in the 
American Chapel, Rue de Berri. This service was 
well attended. The chapel was full, and the aisles 
crowded. All his congregations were chiefly com- 
posed of English people. At the " Oratoire " a 
larger portion of the audience was French than at 
the American chapel. There was no rush, how- 
ever, at either place. The capacity of the houses 
was quietly and entirely filled, and that was all. 
But it was something remarkable for Paris. Mr. 
Coquerel draws such audiences on the Sabbath, 
but we know of no one else who does so. Whether 
he could have done the same five times, on week- 
day afternoons and evenings, is a question. 

After prayer, and a running comment upon the 
103d Psalm, Mr. Spurgeon said that he should 
preach upon the simplest text in the Bible. He 
then announced his text from Acts xvi. 31 : " Be- 
lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be 
saved." He commenced with the description of a 
city of refuge in old Hebrew times, and the roads 
leading to it. These were made straight and 
smooth, that the fugitive might not miss them, or 
stumble on them, but shoot over them to the open 
gate, like the arrow from the bow. These roads 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 53 

were carefully kept. It was the duty of preachers 
to keep the roads to Christ as open, and straight, 
and smooth as possible. All he would do, then, 
would be to heave out of the way any stone of stum- 
bling that might hinder the sinful man from com- 
ing to Christ. He went on to clear the road — of 
the stone of a man's imagining that he was too 
great a sinner to be saved ; of the stone that he 
was unable to come to Christ ; that he had not 
enough feeling ; that he had doubts, fears, and evil 
suggestions. Then he told what was this refuge, 
this salvation. It was Christ alone, not even the 
faith that brought to him. It was Christ's five 
wounds and bleeding side. He ended with a touch- 
ing appeal to come at once to Christ. Say not, 
" Go away, thou sorrowful man, thou makest me 
sad, and destroyest my happiness. I cannot en- 
dure thy thorn-crowned head, and deep gashed 
side." The preacher seemed to wish to say noth- 
ing else but Christ — to point to Him crucified and 
bleeding. He tore down all drapery, all form, all 
doctrine, all philosophy that hung around the cross, 
and veiled the blood of Christ. He spoke in this 
relation some strong and earnest things. " The 
five wounds ! the blood ! the blood ! the blood ! " 
He dwelt upon this with passionate pathos. 

There was a fresh and sensible, it may be said 
sensuous, setting forth of the agony and passion of 
our Lord. The sinner might almost say, " How do 
those five wounds bleed for me ? How does that 
blood wash away my sin ? " And to answer this, 
in the simplest way, would be philosophy. 



54 OLD ENGLAND. 

The next day Mr. Spurgeon preached another 
sermon in the chapel, upon the passage contained 
in Eph. iii. 19 : u And to know the love of Christ 
which passeth knowledge," etc. We might know 
that which was beyond our powers to grasp entirely. 
We might know the science of astronomy, without 
piercing all the secrets of the illimitable universe 
around us. The knowledge of Christ had to be 
learned in its own proper schools, such as holy 
Scripture, Penitence, Suffering, Communion. He 
then went on to speak of what was learned in these 
schools, or the true nature of the love of Christ 
— its breadth ; its depth ; its length ; its height. 
This easy and textual plan was beautifully filled 
out. There was every thing in the sermon to 
charm and move the mind. Little love, little faith, 
was precious. By touching the hem of the Saviour's 
garment, the woman was made whole. But it was 
the Christian's privilege to be filled with the love of 
Christ, to pierce its depths, to soar into its heights, 
to lie in the embrace of his God. This love was 
not a miserable trickling stream, soon running dry, 
but it was a broad perpetual river flowing from 
eternity. The love of Christ was deeper than any 
sin, higher than any attainment in holiness, or 
heavenly joy. In treating of the different schools 
in which this love was learned, his language (said 
a friend) might have satisfied Coleridge or Charles 
Lamb. He said the Bible was not a book of rules 
dry as autumn leaves, but a great, rich, illuminated 
missal, delightful to turn over, every leaf filled with 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. bb 

golden letters, and exquisite pictures, and flowers. 
He traced the features of Christ in it from Gene- 
sis to Revelation. In speaking of the enduring 
character of the love of Christ, that it was from 
God and therefore unchangeable, he introduced a 
touching episode borrowed from an old writer, of 
a conversation that might be supposed to have oc- 
curred at the feast given on the return of the Prod- 
igal Son. In the midst of all the joy, the son was 
sad. " What makes you sad, my son ? " said the 
father ; " is there not enough of good things at the 
feast ? " " Oh yes," said the son. " Do you 
doubt that I love you, my son ? " " Oh no, 
father." " What then makes you sad ? " "I feel, 
father, that I shall sin again, and go away. Make 
me stop here, father." And the father promised 
this, and sadness rolled away from the face of the 
son, and the feast went on with unclouded joy. 
The simple, tender manner in which this was told 
brought tears into many eyes. 

Mr. Spurgeon preached again in the evening at 
the church of the " Oratoire." His plan is to make 
a short introductory prayer, then give out a hymn, 
then read a portion of Scripture, with copious expo- 
sition, then another hymn and the sermon. He 
reads every verse of the hymn twice, and insists 
upon loud, universal congregational singing. He 
gave the organ a contemptuous buffet for spoiling 
all the singing, and would have it done away with 
altogether. Congregational singing, and united 
prayer, were his idea of true worship. His sub- 



56 OLD ENGLAND. 

ject for the evening was Prayer, — from Psalms 
Ixxiii. 27. There were many powerful passages in 
this sermon, but it had not the rich and delightful 
flow of the morning's discourse. He compared 
prayer to a bell in a tall tower. The rope hung 
down to earth ; and when it was pulled it made 
music in heaven. But if the rope were cut, there 
was no response on high. There must be true 
union with God in the heart through faith in Jesus, 
to make prayer efficacious. Prayer, he said, was 
invincible. Like the " Old Guard," God's children 
kneeling might receive the hosts of evil upon the 
bayonets of their prayers. This whole passage, 
which was highly elaborated and impassioned, was 
spoken in a kneeling attitude. This dramatic 
power was continually perceptible in Mr. Spur- 
geon's preaching. He at one time held the great 
Bible above his head with outstretched arms, to 
show that it was above all human authority. 

The fourth sermon was in the American chapel, 
on the next afternoon. It was the crowning effort, 
and established the conviction in the minds of all 
who heard it, that the preacher was capable of a 
very high character of calm, literary excellence, 
and of elevated spiritual thought. His language 
flowed like a river, easy, abundant, clear. After 
expounding the 23d Psalm, comparing it with the 
song of a nightingale, till it sung itself into heaven, 
he took his text from the first sentence : " The 
Lord is my Shepherd." It was a sweet pastoral 
sermon. He had evidently been in the sheep-feed- 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 57 

ino; districts of England. He never laid aside the 
shepherd's crook to the end, but ran every thought 
and argument into this simple mould. Some sheep, 
he said, needed to be lamed and disciplined, because 
they were always leaping fences and straying away. 
This laming was deliberately done by good shep- 
herds. There were always a few pet sheep in the 
flock, that followed close to the shepherd, and they 
were the fat sheep. They got the dainty bits. If 
the shepherd reached up and plucked a soft tuft 
from a high rock, they who were always fondling 
his hand were ready to get it. When he described 
the Shepherd laying down his life for the sheep, he 
drew a vivid and tremendous picture of the death- 
grapple between an Eastern shepherd and a lion 
that had leaped the fold — turning it gradually to 
the dreadful conflict and passion of our Lord with 
the power of darkness and evil. His illustrations 
were almost always of this fresh and picturesque 
character. They were sensible, material, palpable. 
He does not deal in refined and subjective parallel- 
isms of thought, nor does he seek for the scientific 
or the hidden truth. He takes the revealed world 
and Word of God, sees its beauty, draws forth its 
power, is content with its teachings. He alluded 
in the course of this sermon to three men who had 
followed the Shepherd with wonderful closeness, 
who lived upon his hand, and enjoyed his smiles 
and caresses — the evangelical Puseyite, George 
Herbert ; Rutherford, the loving Presbyterian ; 
and another whom he called the odd, adoring Puri- 



58 OLD ENGLAND. 

tan. Mr. Spurgeon has evidently not drunk deep 
at the fonts of modern literature, but he shows his 
reading of the old Puritan divines. His words often 
have a quaint Old English sound to them. He 
speaks of the Devil " sniffing at such paltry de- 
fenses." His sentences are compact and nervous. 
They are sometimes as condensed and massive as 
any of Webster's sentences. They have a hurl, 
and weight, and hiss, like hot shot. But in the ser- 
mon of which we are speaking, the preacher's words 
had a singularly musical and rhythmical flow ; he 
seemed almost to be reciting verse ; and this was 
heightened by his frequent and spontaneous intro- 
duction of snatches of hymns, not always the best 
poetry, but always hearty, sensible, and spicy with 
the devotional associations of ages. 

The last sermon was in the " Oratoire," on the 
same evening. It was upon the " New Song," 
from Rev. xiv. 3 : "And they sung as it were a 
new song before the throne." In this discourse 
there were bursts of true eloquence, but it lacked 
the unity and spontaneous character of the preced- 
ing sermon. The speaker seemed to have the 
feeling that more was expected and required in 
that great church, — that more eyes, and hostile 
eyes, were upon him. In illustrating the loudness 
of the new song, he piled roaring sea upon roaring 
sea in massive layers, but turned skillfully from this 
stupendous chorus to paint the sweetness of the 
song, even as the music of harps, which he de- 
scribed in an exquisite strain, that none but a gen- 
uine lover of music could have done. 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 59 

It is sufficient to converse with him for a little 
time to see that he has a thoroughly kind and char- 
itable heart, and bears no man living ill-will. 

Mr. Spurgeon's personal appearance is too well 
known to need description. He has a blacksmith's 
frame, and a ruddy face, glowing with health and 
good nature. It is a good face, with great purity 
of expression, and at times it shines with a kind of 
celestial radiance. 

The first element of power in his preaching (not 
to mention those higher and secret helps which God 
gives the true preacher of his Word) is undoubt- 
edly his earnestness. No one can doubt that his 
one great purpose is to serve the Master, and 
bring men into his kingdom. He shoots every 
shaft in his quiver with a well-aimed, inflexible in- 
tent to transfix the conscience. There was nothing 
in his Paris visit to show that he was displaying 
himself, but he evidently bent himself to the work 
of awakening Christians to a higher life, and pleas- 
ure-seekers to thought and repentance. Then his 
fluency. This quality may be said to be unrivalled 
in his case. It seems as easy for him to speak as 
to breathe. He preaches without notes, with never 
a stop or break, or ill-made sentence. In the easy, 
continuous flow of his speech, the hearer's mind 
floats along upon it with hardly a consciousness of 
the speaker, which is always a delight. Then again 
his voice. He has a regal voice, with youthful tones 
still in it. It is an " organe ires agrSable" as a 
French gentleman sitting beside me remarked. It 



60 OLD ENGLAND. 

is loud without ever losing its roundness and sweet- 
ness. Also his practicalness. We have said that 
his style of preaching was exceedingly simple and 
objective. It would not be considered sufficiently 
logical or philosophical (in a true sense) for an 
American congregation. He does not reason pro- 
foundly, and avoids the speculative side of truth. 
Yet there is substance and soul-travail in his ser- 
mons. They are not devoid of a certain kind of 
logic. He does not leave his hearers with a mass 
of crude matter, but is careful as to the orderly de- 
velopment of truth. Yet every thing he says is for 
immediate effect. It is pointed to the present in- 
stant. His preaching abounds in well-told facts — 
in close, apt, ringing bits of human experience that 
clench the important and perhaps unwelcome truth. 
He has the Luther temperament, that delights in 
pithy sayings, and stories that penetrate into the 
springs of action, let them be even odd and laugh- 
able. And his dramatic talent. This we have 
spoken of. He is a native orator, knowing how to 
handle his arms, his feet, his head, his eyes ; and 
this subtle faculty all men perceive, if they cannot 
comprehend and describe it. Above all his good- 
ness. This shines out from him. He looks kind, 
friendly, frank, and sympathetic. Let him say 
what he will, he wins esteem, confidence, love. 
He has no cant and long-facedness, though he 
shows himself tremendously in earnest. He has a 
big, warm heart, a sunny countenance, and a pure, 
simple, Christ-like spirit. 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 61 

I have thus dwelt on this English preacher be- 
cause he seems to me to be a singular illustration 
of a higher wisdom in the choice of its instru- 
ments. No dainty-fingered orator, no feeble arm, 
could thus lift up the Gospel in the heart of 
London, could smite with the rod of God's Word 
the Black Sea of London's reeking ignorance, cor- 
ruption and sin. While possessing more refined 
qualities than is generally supposed, he is above 
all a man w T ho can say plain things, who can speak 
strong words. 

It has been estimated that in London less than 
one quarter of the population are attendants upon 
public worship. This is an astounding estimate of 
the number of non-worshipers in the gigantic cap- 
ital of Protestant Christendom. But let one enter 
a London church and he can believe it. The vast 
tide of human life flows past the churches, not into 
them. Why this apathy to the regular worship of 
God ? Why do these hosts turn away from the 
temples of the Most High ? Undoubtedly the mass 
of them belong to the poorer and laboring classes, 
who take Sunday for a day of bodily rest and 
amusement. A great number of them also are 
branded outcasts, religious u pariahs," wdio would 
no more think of entering a church than a palace. 
And they could no more do so, as the churches are 
constituted. But this would leave an immense 
class still, who have sufficient means, social position, 
and intelligence, to be good church-going people in 
formal Old England. Why do not they attend 



62 OLD ENGLAND. 

public worship? It becomes a traveler who has 
limited means of observation to speak modestly, but 
one of the principal reasons of this non-attendance, 
I believe, is that neither the people's minds nor souls 
are sufficiently fed by the preaching. The preach- 
ing that I heard from the two bodies of the Estab- 
lished Church, and also in some of the dissenting 
churches, was, as a general thing, I am forced to 
say, dull and jejune, wanting in interest and draw- 
ing power. On the part of the Establishment there 
was either a narrow circle of argument upon the 
mystic functions of the Church and ritualistic ques- 
tions, or a dry repetition of common orthodox state- 
ments of theology, with little personal earnestness 
and application ; there was a dogmatic assailing 
of heresies, without making the truth itself shine 
out clear ; and lastly, there was such an exclusive 
preaching of the Old Testament as almost to ex- 
clude the brighter light of the New. The only re- 
lief was a tone of tenderness and devotional warmth 
which often broke out unexpectedly, and illu- 
mined the whole service. Among Dissenters there 
seemed to be, with great purity of doctrine, some 
lack of spiritual earnestness, and also of cultured 
style. Such remarks could not of course apply to 
men like Dr. Raleigh, Newman Hall, Dr. Massie, 
and many others. But among both clashes, rarely 
did I hear any thing like close thinking, grasping 
the depths of the subject, and manifesting an orig- 
inal development of truth. The theology seemed 
to be taken bodily from the Prayer-Book, or some 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 63 

ancient manual of doctrine. It was not burned into 
the preacher's mind, and poured glowing into the 
minds of others. And there seemed to be too lit- 
tle of true metaphysical groundwork. It was not 
thought out and through, and the profound and 
delightful harmonies of Truth made to come forth. 
Bald, disjointed, and monotonous declarations, ut- 
tered with the positiveness of ages of unchallenged 
authority, cannot now hold men. Nor is such 
preaching fitted to awaken practical benevolence 
and sympathy for the poorer classes. It does 
not touch the wants and hearts of men, and the 
heart will not go where it does not find either life 
or repose. It is probably the contrast to such 
preaching that makes Spurgeon, notwithstanding 
his occasional rudeness and homeliness, so popular. 
There are many very eloquent divines in England, 
men of fervid faith and stalwart minds ; but the 
level of preaching in England, as to the essential 
qualities of earnestness, force, and manner, is, I be- 
lieve, below that in America, and below it also in 
practical results. I heard Henry Melville preach 
a sermon addressed to working people at Christ's 
Church, Newgate Street. I had long had before 
me an ideal of this distinguished pulpit orator, 
with a name like the sound of a flute. Every thing 
noble, beautiful, and scholar-like was blended in 
that conception. He was probably thin, worn with 
thought, but with classic features and spiritual 
brow, and with the voice of a silver trumpet. He 
was calm and peaceful like a deep river, but rolling 



64 OLD ENGLAND. 

along rich burdens of thought. Alas ! I found a 
grizzle-haired athlete in the desk, a brusque old 
gentleman, with sanguine manner, with a voice 
like a November storm, and a dogmatic positiveness 
in the enunciation of sensible but commonplace 
propositions, that fairly astonished me. He flamed 
away against sceptics, and called them " pert cox- 
combs," and other old-fashioned names of scorn. 
What he said may have been sound, but it was not 
peculiarly salted with learning, nor inspired with 
high spiritual views. It was undoubtedly meant to 
be adapted to the class of working people, which I 
did not think of at the time, and I hardly recovered 
myself sufficiently in the course of the evening to 
recognize a remarkable degree of vigor of style 
and delivery. My English friends told me it was 
not a favorable specimen of his preaching. I had a 
different but not much more satisfactory experience 
in listening to another sermon addressed to working 
people by Rev. F. D. Maurice. It was in the 
ancient chapel of Lincoln's-Inn-Fields, that den of 
lawyers. He is a short man, with piercing black 
eyes, very pleasant face, but worn and scholar-like, 
and with a thoughtful pensiveness of expression. 
The loved brother-in-law of Sterling, the friend of 
Archdeacon Hare, of the present Bishop of Oxford, 
of Kingsley and Tennyson, he must have an attach- 
ing and stimulating power. But he does not show 
it in the pulpit, and his small congregation proved it. 
His delivery was artificial, almost a sing-song tone, 
and by no means distinct ; and his style was alto- 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 65 

gether too high-pitched and essayish, to reach a 
common audience, much less an assembly of uned- 
ucated men. It sounded just as his books read ; 
with now and then the gleam of a suggestive 
thought, but with no clear development of it. The 
experience of some others in respect to Mr. Maur- 
ice's preaching is also different from my own, 
therefore I advance it with some hesitation. He 
wields in England an indefinable though perhaps 
not now increasing influence. He is liked for his 
manliness, his progressive capacity, and his noble 
sympathy with the religious doubts and difficulties 
of men. He shows more sympathy for the igno- 
rant and lower classes than practical power to help 
them. He does not certainly possess the logical 
faculty in a high degree, and his style is criticized 
for its vagueness ; but his intuitions of truth are 
penetrative and sometimes profound. He is not 
a good guide, but is an independent explorer. His 
bold gropings in the dark will have increased the 
limits of truth. He lacks that objective or positive 
element of faith, that all great preachers and theo- 
logians have had, and is disposed to refine Christian 
truth too much. In his controversy with Mr. Man- 
sell he showed the more Christ-like spirit, and in 
many things assumed a higher and more immovable 
position. He by no means admits himself to be an 
innovator upon the old Faith ; but means to be a 
reviver of its deeper claims on our obedience and 
love. He holds that our nature was made for 
Faith. He thinks that man can know God, and 

5 



66 OLD ENGLAND. 

the Son of God ; that he may feel assured of the 
truth, and have the living demonstration of the 
truth in his own heart. His views of the character 
of God are also attractive, regarding Him prima- 
rily in the light of a Father. Yet it must be 
said that generally in England he is considered 
to have introduced an ideal and modified system, 
that views Christianity in the aspect of a fact ac- 
complished, and which every man has but to open 
his eyes upon and enjoy, rather than of a truth that 
must be personally received by every man, and 
enter into every soul's individual experience for its 
renewal and eternal life. In conversation at his 
own pleasant home, if one be not converted to all 
of Mr. Maurice's opinions, he will be converted to 
Mr. Maurice himself, as a noble man and Christian 
gentleman. Rev. Newman Hall occupies the pul- 
pit of Surrey Chapel in Southwark, where Rowland 
Hill preached for nearly fifty years. It is a dingy, 
octagonal brick edifice, plain within and without. 
Mr. Hall is a whole-souled man, speaking that 
which he knows and believes, and reminding one 
of an earnest American preacher. There is spirit- 
ual life in his ministrations, but he has, it appeared 
to me, a somewhat strained and hammering style. 
The audience looked like an intelligent New Eng- 
land congregation 

In polish of manner and outward grace, Dr. 
Cumming, of Craven Court Chapel, near Covent 
Garden, is superior to all these. Nor, when I 
heard him was there aught visionary or apocalyptic 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 67 

in his discourse. Before the sermon he gave an 
exposition of the 23d chapter of Matthew, which 
might have been continued through Mark, Luke, 
and John. A peerless capacity for " continuous- 
ness," has Dr. Gumming. But there was much 
that was fresh in it. He did not shrink from say- 
ing that such and such a passage was not translated 
rightly, as for instance " straining at a gnat and 
swallowing a camel," should be " straining out a 
gnat," &c, in allusion to the practice of straining 
wine through a fine sieve. His sermon on the 
text, " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem," &c, had a mag- 
nificent ending, in which he described the new 
Jerusalem coming down from heaven, and em- 
bracing all the goodness that God had inspired and 
recreated in human nature. He has little sweep 
or largeness of manner, but great ease and flow. 
It is a conversational style. His voice is rich and 
mellow without being powerful. He is a tall man, 
with high white forehead and dark hair. It was 
difficult to find a seat even upon the pulpit stairs. 
Dr. Cumming, as a graceful yet not effeminate 
preacher, has good claims to his celebrity. 

I will not speak further of the preachers of the 
Established Church whom I heard. Some of them 
compared well with those already named ; but in 
regard to the Church of England, in its ministry, 
polity, and general features, notwithstanding its 
noble history, its benevolent spirit, and its essential 
purity, from my own limited observation, and cer- 
tainly from no uncharitable or prejudiced state of 



68 OLD ENGLAND. 

mind, I am disposed to coincide with a remark 
in the "London Review," "that great practical 
changes must be made in the arrangements and 
working of the Church of England if she is to be 
the spiritual home of the whole people of the land, 
as she ought to be." The English Church has not, 
in the spirit of true Christian philanthropy, gauged 
human misery to the bottom — has not truly 
preached the Gospel to the poor. Methodism ran 
before and did this work for it. But how much 
remains still to be done in a city like London ! 
Yet, it should be said, while these high instru- 
mentalities of the great London parish churches 
fail to do their appointed task, humbler ministries, 
raised up and going forth it may be from their 
bosom, are effecting a silent but mighty work in 
the moral wastes of London, and like invisible 
angels are continually active in soothing the sor- 
rows and spreading the tables of the poor. 

There is one thing to be admired in the worship 
of the English Church — the apparent unity and 
fervor of devotional interest and feeling in the 
congregation. The moment the text is announced 
there is a general opening of Bibles, all following 
the preacher's explanation of the passage with the 
greatest earnestness. The singing also is diffusive 
and congregational. There are no instrumental 
interludes between the stanzas of the hymn. 
There is no flourishing of trumpets in the playing 
of the organ, and nothing like executing music. 
Art is subordinated to devotion more than it is 



LONDON ART AND THE LONDON PULPIT. 69 

with us. The choir is mixed up with the congre- 
gation, thus giving correctness and fire to the sing- 
ing of all the people. I have never heard in 
Catholic countries, or in any part of the world, 
church music, that for beauty, animation, and fer- 
vor, at all equalled the choral singing in the public 
service of the great English cathedrals. 

In closing this chapter, I would simply add that 
in speaking of the defects of the English Church, 
I have not had reference so much to the individ- 
uals composing that Church, as to the system itself 
which produces these defects. The faults of the 
Established Church, in whose body may be reck- 
oned some of the most perfectly developed and 
beautifully symmetric Christian characters to be 
found on earth — these faults are inseparably con- 
nected with the working of a State Church. In 
the same manner much of the rigid controversial 
spirit of Dissent arises from its long continued and 
sincerely maintained hostile position ; and in such 
hard soil have matured some of the richest and 
noblest spirits of the age. 



CHAPTER IV. 

ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 

While in London I made an excursion to Stoke 
Pogis, the much-bewritten scene of the most sol- 
emnly harmonious poem in existence. It was the 
favorite poem of Daniel Webster, in whose mind 
there was a vein of pensiveness, and its music 
soothed the weary statesman's dying hours. As 
was the case with Goethe, so it was true in a far 
more marked manner with Gray, that " nothing 
came to him in his sleep." He wrote, it is said, 
on an average about ten lines of poetry a day : 
three golden verses of " The Elegy on a Country 
Churchyard " a day, were surely enough for any 
man to have wrought. The village is situated 
near Slough, on the Great Western Railway. 
After leaving Slough one drives into a hedge- 
fringed lane with tall elms on either side. Passing 
the entrance of Lord Taunton's Park, and turning 
into it by the side of a flower-embosomed cottage, 
the spire of the church comes in view ; and trav- 
ersing the trim lawn of the Park one arrives at 
the gate of the " Country Churchyard." This 
ancient church is now, of course, more " ivy- 
mantled " than in Gray's time. It is built of flint 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 71 

pebbles, with red-tiled roofs, and has three low 
gable fronts, with long windows and a tower 
draped thickly with ivy. The spire upon it looks 
modern. There is a brick wall and screen of tall 
trees about the churchyard, separating it from the 
Park. The " rugged elms " and the " yew-trees' 
shade," spread their shadows in front of the curi- 
ous wooden porch and over many a " heaving 
turf." There are some moss-grown monuments, 
but not as many as I expected to see. It is a 
humble " country churchyard." A small slab 
under the window of one of the gable ends of the 
church bears these words: " Opposite to this stone, 
in the same tomb upon which he has so feelingly 
recorded his grief at the loss of a beloved parent, 
are deposited the remains of Thomas Gray, the 
author of ' The Elegy written in a Country 
Churchyard,' &c, &c. He was buried August 6, 
1771." 

The tombstone which lies under the window 
bears an inscription to the poet's aunt, and also 
the following one to his mother : " In the same 
pious confidence, beside her friend and sister, here 
sleep the remains of Dorothy Gray, widow, the 
careful and tender mother of many children, one 
of whom alone had the misfortune to survive her. 
She died March 11, 1733, aged 67." 

Birds in great numbers flew around among 
the trees, and hopped fearlessly upon the tombs. 
The air had the delicate hum of insect life, and 
now and then the whir and flutter of little wings ; 



72 OLD ENGLAND. 

otherwise it was as still and reposeful as the 
grave. 

Walking a short distance over the green meadow 
in front of the church, one comes to a pretty 
laburnum-fringed path, that leads to a stately and 
classic stone monument, with a grove over against 
it and a swelling green hill beyond. It commands 
a fine view of the church and graveyard. The 
monument is in honor of Gray, and of the region 
consecrated by his genius. It has quotations from 
the " Elegy " and other poems. In the direction 
of the grove is written the stanza beginning with, 

" Hard by yon wood now smiling as in scorn." 

On the opposite side toward Eton are the well- 
known verses, — 

" Ye distant spires, 
Ye antique towers," &c. 

On the side looking toward the churchyard are 
the deathless " household words " that sing so 
sweetly of death and the grave. 

I sincerely hope that in the foregoing brief 
description I have not committed the blunder of 
another American tourist, who, after expending a 
great amount of poetical sympathy upon the spot, 
discovered that he had pitched upon the wrong 
churchyard. 

Hampton Court, standing quiet and empty amid 
its gardens, is but three quarters of an hour's ride 
from the Waterloo Station, by the South Western 
Railway. We are set down on the bank of the 
Thames, but as different from the Thames at Lon- 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 73 

don, as a fair-faced and pure-hearted child from a 
black giant man reeking with every foulness and 
corruption. We row over the tranquil, osier-fringed 
stream, followed by greedy swans that fearlessly 
oar themselves along by our side. We are met 
on landing by a greedier company of little girls, 
who press upon visitors their baskets of straw- 
berries. The sober though majestic red-brick walls 
of the Palace are before us, and we enter its clean- 
swept and solitary courts. Court-yard opens be- 
yond court-yard. The first is that of Wolsey ; 
the second that of Henry VIII. ; the third of Wil- 
liam III. ; and the fourth of George II. We 
ascend Wolsey's grand staircase, — a type of his 
superb taste who designed and built this palace on 
a scale corresponding too nearly to his own regal 
ideas. Hampton Court opened the eyes of Henry 
VIII. Here, the prelate who just missed the 
Popedom from having been a private tutor in the 
Marquis of Dorset's family, had bishops to wait 
upon him, and compelled the first noblemen in the 
realm to present him water and napkin. So says 
the historian ; who also relates that at Hampton 
Court were two hundred and eighty beds of silk 
for royal and noble guests. The Richelieu of 
England would also have governed it to the end, 
had Henry VIII. been a Louis XIII. But this 
monarch had great governing capacity of his own. 
In his face, with his thick dewlaps and eyes stand- 
ing out with fatness, there is a vast rough energy. 
Be his sins ever so great, he was master of his 



74 OLD ENGLAND. 

kingdom. He outgrew his minister. He could 
understand the greatness of Wolsey, and so high 
was the king's estimate of his talents, that some 
of the last political failures of Wolsey were evi- 
dently attributed to his want of fidelity, not of 
foresight ; this fact sealed his downfall. There 
have been in the long course of English history 
three prelates who have attempted the subjugation 
of England, — Dunstan, Thomas a Becket, and 
Thomas Wolsey. Froude says, Wolsey " loved 
England well but Rome better." He dreamed 
of rebuilding the Catholic Church in more than 
its former glory. In these late years there has 
been another bold attempt of this sort, but the 
scheme, though deeply laid, has lacked the pow- 
erful genius to direct, or has happened some cen- 
turies too late. The long suites of apartments 
in Hampton Court, " empty, swept, and garn- 
ished," contain a few good pictures, especially the 
portraits of the children of George III. by West ; 
but there is a rumor that this palace is made a 
lumber-room for things too valuable to be thrown 
away, yet not good enough for the choicer collect- 
ions. Perhaps this is saying too much ; Hamp- 
ton Court is understood to be a gathering place 
of historical antiquities. In the room hung around 
with the beauties of the Court of Charles II. — 
and they are splendid English beauties — it is 
well that the irreproachable one among them 
should be the most lovely of all, — the Countess 
of Grammont. 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 75 

Many of the rooms have pictures commemora- 
tive of the reign of William III. His own home- 
ly but high and intrepid face is frequently seen. 
Here was the favorite residence of this king who 
loved to shut himself up in perfect seclusion ; and 
it was when riding from Kensington to Hampton 
Court, that he fell and broke his collar-bone, which 
was the occasion of his death. The "Cartoons 1 " 
of Raphael are the precious things of this palace. 
These original drawings on paper are nobler than 
any copies of them in tapestry or on canvas. 
They show that grace was not the greatest quality 
of Raphael, that breadth, dignity and power were 
equally his. These u Cartoons " justify the re- 
mark of Lanzi, that notwithstanding the beauty 
of Raphael's female heads, his male heads have a 
nobler character. Yet it is after all a little amus- 
ing to hear art-critics attempt to defend the small 
boats, and the storks, in the picture of the " Mi- 
raculous Draught of Fishes." 

In the " Hall of Henry VIII." the architectural 
glories of the palace centre. The ceiling is of the 
richest open beam-work, with pendent corbels. 
Here also is some genuine old arras. There is a 
tradition that in the time of Elizabeth, Shaks- 
peare's plays were first acted in this hall. Small 
but interesting portraits of Wolsey, Henry VIII. , 
and his seven wives, adorn the room. In this 
room probably James I. held that annoying confer- 
ence with the conflicting parties of the Church and 
Puritan denominations, in which he enunciated the 

1 Lately removed to Kensington Museum. 



76 OLD ENGLAND. 

famous apothegm of " no bishop, no king; " and he 
boasted afterward, in a letter to a Scotch friend, 
" that he kept such a revel with the Puritans these 
two days as was never heard the like ; where I 
have peppered them as roundly as ye have done 
the Papists. They fled me so from argument to 
argument, without ever answering me directly, as 
I was forced at last to say unto them," &c, &c. 
Glimpses of the garden from various windows and 
angles made me more desirous to see the outside 
than the inside of the house, on such a sweet, 
cloudless, balmy morning. It was in the month of 
June. The loveliness of an English garden ! I 
don't care to describe it artistically, even if I were 
able to do so ; it is enough to enjoy it. In what 
other country could one find the same perfection ; 
not in France surely, where the trees stand like 
"gens cFarmes" shouldering their muskets. The 
grass, green the year round, is as soft, and bright, 
and springy, as that of some hidden alpine pasture. 
It grows close up under the trees and shrubs, to 
their very stems, so that the shadows are beauti- 
ful upon the smooth velvet. We do not always see 
this in our more fiery America. The rich varieties 
of standard roses, and the English guelder-rose with 
its superb white blossoms, embroider the borders of 
the long terraces. The dark shade of the sycamore 
mixes with the lighter green of the oak. The 
smooth-leaved elegant lime, brought into England 
by the Romans from Italy, whose blossoms are so 
deliciously fragrant, forms groups with the rougher 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 77 

pine and the trailing elm. What matters it that 
the lines are artificial ? It can be forgiven when 
every thing is so fresh, and so wonderfully neat, as 
if the elves and fays had shaved the borders and 
polished the leaves. Naught is heard but the faint 
plash of the fountain and the warble of birds. Near 
the fountain we found some blind persons sitting. 
They had been invited to pass the day in the gar- 
dens, to enjoy the summer perfumes and the pleas- 
ant sounds. The English excel in these little refine- 
ments of benevolence. They make them a study. 
The visitor is shown the famous Black Hamburgh 
vine, which requires a whole conservatory for it- 
self, and produces every year from 2000 to 3000 
bunches of grapes. It is said to be over two hun- 
dred and fifty years old. 

I took a carriage and drove through Bushy 
Park toward Twickenham and Richmond. The 
first part of the way lay through a splendid avenue 
of horse-chestnut trees, the Park stretching away 
pleasantly in green glades on either side. It 
seemed to be a merry time on this midsummer 
day. Everybody was out junketing. There 
were dancing parties under the oaks, with all the 
gypsy apparatus of baskets, plates and pans, spread 
upon the grass. We met cricket matches going 
on, each with its absorbed crowd of spectators. 
Every little village has its cricket ground ; but 
there are permanent centres, or societies, for the 
instruction and organization of this game, that give 
the law to the kingdom. The laws of cricket, as 



78 OLD ENGLAND. 

put forth by the celebrated " Mary-le-bone Club," 
are contained in forty-seven articles, as precisely 
drawn up and worded as the statutes of Parlia- 
ment. And all this to knock down two or three 
sticks stuck in the ground ! But these sticks are 
guarded by such skill, activity, and tenacity, that 
all the manhood in the field is brought out in this 
exciting sport. Cricket, and foot-ball, and quoits, 
and golf, and bowling, and hurling, and rowing, 
and riding, and hunting, go far to make the deep- 
chested, big-armed, enduring English race. Are 
not these sports preferable to the flashy listlessness 
with which many of our fashionable youth, both 
in city and country, consume their leisure hours ? 
It is better to get an arm broken in foot-ball, or 
in being thrown from a horse, than to have the 
whole system and soul eaten out by smoking, 
drinking, and in-door idle dissipation. When, a 
youth or young man has grown to be too lazy to 
play foot-ball, or base-ball, or cricket, there is not 
much hope for him intellectually or morally. Of 
late years, it is true, American muscularity has 
made astonishing progress, and the war has done 
more for us than cricketing. But this love of 
energetic sport and of out-of-door life runs through 
all classes. It gives England her race of Nestors 
in the field and in the council. We heard of Lord 
Palmerston riding thirty miles on a stretch. Have- 
lock drank no wine, brandy, or even ale. An 
early riser, a hard rider, a lover of Nature, he was 
ready to do the impetuous work of a young man 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 79 

in his old age. An English family of the wealthier 
class considers it the greatest luxury, and the real 
superiority which wealth gives, to be able to be 
out of doors, walking, sketching, botanizing, riding, 
driving, almost all the day. Perhaps this is car- 
ried too far by the " spindle-side " of the family ; 
for an English lady, it is said, knows very little 
of the practical management of home matters. 
She secures fine health and a well-stored mind, 
but her hands rarely touch the household machine. 
This is left pretty much to the housekeeper and 
the servants — a rank heresy in the eyes of a 
New England matron who possesses " faculty." 

We soon came on to " Strawberry Hill," the 
home of Horace Walpole. A high wall shut in 
the grounds and indeed the house itself from the 
road, though glimpses of the lawn and garden 
showed that they were charmingly laid out. They 
were not open to visitors. King Louis Philippe at 
one time lived here. Here the cunning letter- 
writer sat like a spider, and drew into his brilliant 
dew-spangled country web all things, characters, 
history, and gossip, that was rife in his day. He 
sucked the life out of his times, and sometimes 
ejected his poison also into them. " That was the 
great event in the day," some one has said, " when 
the mail was made up at Strawberry Hill." It 
may be remembered that in one of his letters he 
speaks of " a young Mr. Burke, who wrote a book 
in the style of Lord Bolingbroke, that was much 
admired." 



80 OLD ENGLAND. 

Leaving the Teddington Road upon our right, I 
drove on through a shaded lane to Twickenham, 
passing by the spot where Pope's villa once stood. 
It must be acknowledged that these wits, Wal- 
pole, Pope, Thomson, and their London fellows- 
poets who ruralized in the vicinity, had good 
taste. The Thames lies in broad, silvery reaches 
in the vale of Twickenham, with gem-like islets ; 
and " Richmond Hill " is a green cockney Parnas- 
sus. We do not wonder that the neighborhood of 
London gave a tinge of the artificial sublime to 
their productions. Pope could not forget that 
the brilliant Lord Bolingbroke was to have the 
reading of his verses, and that they would be dis- 
cussed by befrilled gallants at the clubs. He 
never got at the heart of Nature or man. If he 
" scorned the city and its meaner ways," and the 
smiles of the great, and the shams of polite life, and 
drew pastoral pictures of humanity, it was still "the 
pride that apes humility." Give me poor Cowper's 
more genial and honest love of Nature, and of man, 
with all his diseased fancies ! He did scorn the 
mean and evil things of his day, and sought his 
refuge in the solaces of Nature, his own heart, and 
the Divine Word. 

At Twickenham is a French colony of royal ex- 
iles. Orleans House, beautifully situated near the 
river, where the Due d'Aumale now lives, was 
purchased by his father Louis Philippe. The story 
is told here with gusto that when the king, under 
the name of" Mr. Smith," applied to the man who 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 81 

had the care of the house, in order to look at it, he 
recognized in him a person whom he had pre- 
viously known when he lived in this neighborhood. 
He said, "I have seen you before, have I not? " 

" It may be, I was once gardener at ." 

" Well, what do you do now ?;" " Now I keep 
the ' Crown.' 5 "Ah," said the ex-monarch with 
a shrug, " I tried to keep the Crown too, but I did 
not succeed." Claremont House, where the old 
Queen Amelia lived, is some distance away from 
the river to the right. We drove over the mead- 
ows and crossed Richmond Bridge, climbing up 
that long and far-famed hill, to the " Star and Gar- 
ter Hotel." With every evidence of the most 
sumptuous abundance, I could not get a morsel of 
luncheon, and was decidedly informed that it was 
impossible to be served, — that orders must be left 
four hours beforehand. This was true, as every- 
body in England must dine alone, and all the rooms 
were occupied. After enjoying the fine view from 
the terrace of the hotel, over the valley, park, and 
river, softened with a delicate golden haze of early 
summer afternoon, I went on to Kew. Here, at a 
neat inn, I met with a better reception, and when 
the strawberries and cream were finished, was pre- 
pared to enjoy a walk in the Gardens. They are 
the largest public gardens in England. They for- 
merly belonged to the Georges, and were part of 
the grounds of the old Kew Palace. Sir Joseph 
Banks in his day was greatly interested in" the lay- 
ing out and nourishing of the Botanic Gardens, 

6 



82 OLD ENGLAND. 

and planted them with exotics obtained by himself 
in his voyage around the world. In 1841 a new 
impulse was given to the improvement of the 
grounds, and the plan was adopted to make this the 
home of all the plants that grew within the borders 
of the British Empire, the world over. One sees 
the harmoniously combined beauties of all parts of 
the earth, and the marriage of the tropics with the 
arctics, as if it were Eden from which all things 
sprung, or a restored Eden, in which all things 
again flourish. Such a garden makes us think of 
the physical capabilities of the earth, when it shall 
be brought under the perfect influences of Love, 
Light, and Order. The immense " Palm-house," 
or " Palm-stove " in the midst of the garden, is its 
chief point of interest. From it three broad walks 
or vistas radiate, one of them running nearly a 
mile to the river's brink. Its hot-water pipes ex- 
tend 24,000 feet in length. Beneath its glass roof 
one may see the fan-leaved trees of the Pacific 
Islands, and the spice-trees and banyan of India, 
the caoutchouc, the cotton and the indigo plant. 

Near by is the tropical "Aquarium," where the 
glory of Kew Gardens, the " Victoria Kegia " 
from South America, grows. Here also the papy- 
rus is cultivated, from which good paper has been 
made. To the west of the " Palm-house " extends 
the " Pinetum," a grove of some twenty-four acres, 
devoted to coniferous trees. In front of the 
" Palm-house " is an artificial pond. It is delight- 
ful at the calm hour of evening to walk in a garden 



ENVIRONS OF LONDON. 83 

like this when the flowers are sending up their in- 
cense, and all colors blend together, and all de- 
scriptions of plants, from the cedar of Lebanon to 
the lowly English laurel, and whinbush, are to be 
seen. The humblest ferns and heaths are not 
wanting. The heaths of Australia, I remember, 
were particularly beautiful. 



CHAPTER V. 

HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 

Eighty-three miles from London, upon the 
London and Birmingham Railway, is the town of 
Rugby, anciently Rokeby. Although Rugby lies 
near the river Avon, it has little natural beauty. 
Speaking of mountain scenery, Dr. Arnold writes : 
" I only know of five counties in England which 
cannot supply it, and I am unluckily perched down 
in one of them. These five are Warwick, North- 
ampton, Huntingdon, Cambridge, and Bedford. 
I should add perhaps Rutland, and you cannot 
name a seventh ; for Suffolk, which is otherwise just 
as bad, has its bit of sea-coast. We have no hills, 
no plains, not a single wood, and but one single 
copse ; no heath, no down, no rock, no river, no 
clear stream, scarcely any flowers, for the lias is 
particularly poor in them ; nothing but an endless 
monotony of inclosed fields and hedge-row trees. 
This is to me a daily privation ; it robs me of what 
is naturally my anti-attrition, and as I grow older I 
begin to feel it. My constitution is sound but not 
strong, and I feel any little pressure or annoyance 
more than I used to do ; and the positive dullness 
of the country about Rugby makes it to me a mere 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 85 

working-place. I cannot expatiate here even in 
my walks." It proves - the nobleness of the man, 
that during his vacation rambles, his visits to West- 
moreland, and his journeyings in Switzerland and 
Italy, in which he showed the bounding enthusiasm 
of a boy, he always kept his eye steadily on uncon- 
genial Rugby as the place of his work. He had an 
aim in life, a work to do, which he placed above 
the cultivation of the beautiful, and which was the 
most beautiful thing. He was wont to repeat the 
words of Bacon, "In this world God only and his 
angels may be spectators." 

But before speaking further of Dr. Arnold, or 
Rugby, I would say a word about a brief visit to 
Bilton Hall, the home of Addison. This is a mile 
and a half to the south of Rugby. I was kindly 
permitted to see the house and grounds. There is 
a fine avenue of trees, or short drive, leading up to 
the house, which last is not seen until one comes 
into the court-yard itself. It is an old-fashioned 
and picturesque building, rather low, but covering 
much ground. Though aware of the historical fact, 
one naturally asks how could a literary man have 
gotten himself housed in such a famous old pile? 
I passed through the house into the garden. This 
is large and pleasantly laid out, without being stiff. 
Beyond the garden and separated from it by a wire 
fence, is an ancient park. There were no orna- 
ments but trees and smooth lawns. The trees were 
here and there disposed for shady walks. A little 
summer-house upon a green knoll near the mansion 



86 OLD ENGLAND. 

was the favorite resort of Addison. This summer- 
house is particularly mentioned in the sketch of Ad- 
dison's life in the " History of the Kit-cat Club." 
It was an agreeable nook for well-dressed Sir Roger 
de Coverley with his moderate and well-regulated 
love of Nature, to take his philosophical siesta in. 
The flower-garden, especially rich in roses, and just 
then in its June brilliancy, was directly in front of 
the house, sending its delicious perfume into the 
open windows. It seemed altogether a most genial 
and home-like spot. The drawing-room was a fine 
apartment, hung around with full-length pictures, 
chiefly historical, among which James I. figures 
with his look of wisdom. I was last of all shown 
up-stairs into Addison's study, truly a contrast to 
Henry Kirke White's, or even Southey's. It 
seemed to correspond in size with the room below, 
and here Addison wrote much of his " Spectator," 
walking to and fro the length of the room, as was 
his wont. There was the very table (so I was 
told) upon which he wrote. It was now well cov- 
ered with books, and the whole apartment bore ev- 
idence of a refined culture in its present occupants. 
How could it be otherwise with Addison himself 
looking down upon them in a life-like portrait ! 
The features are handsome, but there is a shade too 
much of the fine gentleman in the redundant curls, 
open collar, and brave air. The portrait of his 
child, " Miss Addison," as the waiting-woman 
called her, hung by his side. In the other part of 
the room was the likeness of his wife, the Countess 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 87 

Dowager of Warwick, a very good face, resembling 
Queen Anne, but more amiable and gentle. Yet 
she was any thing but gentle, it is said. There was 
also a portrait of her son, a slender, aristocratic- 
looking youth, the same whom Addison summoned 
for him to see how a Christian could die. 

And now for Rugby School. Its battlemented, 
castle-like walls and buildings form the prominent 
object in the small country town. It is indeed all 
the place. Its army of boys and teachers over- 
whelm every other interest and association. The 
school was founded in Queen Elizabeth's day by 
one Lawrence Sheriff, a London merchant born in 
Rugby. The original donation during this long 
period has greatly increased in value, so that the 
school enjoys a revenue of some .£5000 from this 
source alone. The general plan of the school is as 
follows : " Any person who has resided for two 
years at Rugby, or at any place in the county of 
Warwick within ten miles of it, or in the adjacent 
counties of Leicester and Northampton, to the dis- 
tance of five miles from it, is entitled to send his 
sons to receive their education at the school without 
payment. But if a parent lives out of the town of 
Rugby, his son must lodge at one of the regular 
school boarding-houses, and the expenses of his 
board are the same as those incurred by a boy not 
on the foundation. Boys who have this right to 
the advantages of the institution are called 'founda- 
tioners,' and their number is not limited." 

Classical studies are all in all at Rugby, and in 



88 OLD ENGLAND. 

Arnold's time the school won its preeminence in 
these studies. He introduced a thorough drill in 
the grammatic elements of language, that laid a 
sure foundation for good scholarship. Nothing 
could atone, in his eyes, for grammatical incorrect- 
ness, no beauty of expression or ingenuity of con- 
struction. He threw new life into the readings of 
the old authors, by opening to the minds of his pu- 
pils fields of illustrative truth in history, geography, 
ethnology, and art. He taught his pupils to dis- 
criminate between different ages of the same lan- 
guage, the colorings of outward circumstances, and 
the changes of idiom. The consequence of this 
training was that Rugby boys have studied with 
the zest of mature minds, and have taken the first 
stand at Oxford. Arnold also had the courage to 
introduce the natural sciences and the modern lan- 
guages into Rugby, and though it is said that he did 
not become himself a perfect German scholar, he 
has done for England what Stuart did for America ; 
he opened the way to the general study of the Ger- 
man in English schools and universities. '* He 
changed the face of public education throughout 
England." But he did infinitely more than this, — 
he drew back education to its true source. He 
chased out the spirit of a negative philosophy, which 
separated the school from all divine influences and 
nourished a deep immorality. In the discipline of 
the school, and its entire system of instruction, he 
let in the sunshine of the Divine Word. He chris- 
tianized the school as he would have done the 
state. 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 89 

The buildings of Rugby School are of the 
square English Gothic, and are of considerable size 
and extent. There is a turreted gateway Tower, 
a handsome Chapel, and a cloistered quadrangle. 
The whole edifice, however, has a rough look, or 
the boys have made it look so. What building 
could stand centuries of boys ! The pyramids have 
never stood such a test. There is a large park 
upon one side, with great elms but miserable 
scanty grass. The whole has a half-ecclesiastical, 
half-military aspect. I was introduced through a 
flower-embowered porch into the principal's house 
and study. It was Dr. Arnold's room. It was 
the room where " Tom Brown " had his heart- 
searching interview with the great man. The por- 
trait of Arnold, with its intense, almost fiery expres- 
sion, as if in agony with some brave thought or 
purpose, and other pictures and busts, adorned the 
room. Papers, pamphlets, and books, crowded 
every part of it. It was " the heart of the con- 
cern," where the " Head-master " wrote, thought, 
toiled, and prayed. I was allowed to visit the 
whole establishment, and had considerable conver- 
sation with some of the instructors. Boys under 
thirteen or fourteen years of age were not recom- 
mended to come to Rugby, as the system was 
adapted to minds and characters that had acquired 
some tone of self-regulation. No one can remain 
at Rugby after he has reached nineteen. I peeped 
into the boys' studies, minute apartments six by 
four, opening into a large arched passage-way. 



90 OLD ENGLAND. 

Here was amusingly shown the natural history of 
a school-boy's mind. The arranging and orna- 
menting of each room is according to its own occu- 
pant's particular fancy. Pictures, plaster-of-Paris 
figures, flowers, whips, boxing-gloves, mingled with 
maps, slates, and books. Here was the boy artis- 
tic, the boy athletic, the boy commercial, and the 
boy sentimental. But, on the whole, pictures of 
hunting scenes predominated. The boys' un- 
leashed minds evidently ran on horses and dogs. 
Some of the little dens were as neat as Shaking 
Quakers' herb-stalls, and some, say most, were 
genuine hurra - nests. I may have passed 
" Brown's " and "Arthur's " room, and that of 
their queer, bird-stuffer friend, but I did not know 
them. It is a good idea to let a boy have a place 
that he can call his own, where he is lord of his 
own castle. This breeds contentment, develops 
taste, and encourages the reflective spirit, so want- 
ing in the hasty mind of youth. The dormitories 
were bare, lofty rooms, the scenes of many a 
Waterloo pillow-fight, shy prank, and hard joke. 
No wonder little Arthur could not say his prayers 
unmolested here ! The class-rooms, and even the 
room where Dr. Arnold taught the illustrious 
" Sixth," were of the barest, roughest character. 
As every boy is allowed to cut his name on his 
own desk after having been a certain time in 
school, the desks and tables are horribly hacked. 
Some of them are but spindle-waisted skeletons of 
what they once were. They look like the work of 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 91 

beavers. One hardly sees how they can be used 
for the purposes of writing and study. Compared 
with the convenient furniture and handsome fit- 
tings of modern American school-houses, these 
apartments appeared semi-barbarian. But there 
was a certain pleasing contrast in the polished classic 
culture that issues from these rooms, and the abso- 
lute savageness of their whole aspect and furnish- 
ing. Rugby is considered rough, though standing 
the highest in manhood and morals of all the Eng- 
lish schools. Eton and Harrow are the aristo- 
cratic schools. Shrewsbury is now equal to any in 
scholarship. 

The Arnold Library, which has been built since 
the Doctor's decease, contains the nucleus of a fine 
classical and historic collection. I noticed among 
the books a complete set of Arnold's own works. In 
the yard under the chapel windows we saw some 
young Rugbyans playing racket. Out of this yard 
extends the broad and famous " Campus Martius," 
the scene of the foot-ball glories. Rugbeia floreat ! 

What a grand spirit of movement and power 
Arnold infused into his whole system of instruction. 
It was a mingling of the best idea of old Greek cul- 
ture with the Christian, in which the body should 
become the strong instrument of the trained mind 
and free heart, open to every pure, high, heroic 
feeling ! 

The Chapel is the culmination of the interests of 
the spot. In the north transept stands the monu- 
ment of Dr. Arnold. It bears a Latin inscription 



92 OLD ENGLAND. 

from the pen of his friend Bunsen. As a specimen 
of monumental Latinity I give this inscription. 

VIR. REV. 

THOMAS. ARNOLD. S. T. P. 

HISTORIC. RECENT. MVI. TRADEND-ffi. APVD. OXONIEN. PRO. REG. 

HVXVS. SCHOLE. PER. ANNOS. XIV. ANTISTES. STRENWS. VNICE. DILECTVS. 

THVCIDIDEM. ILLVSTRAVTT. HISTORIAM. ROMANAM. SCRLPSIT. 

POPULI. CHRISTIAN!. 

LIBERTATEM. DIGNITATEM. VINDICAVIT, FIDEM. CONFIRMAVIT. SCRIPXIS. 

VITA. 

CHRISTVM. PR^DICAVIT. APVD. VOS. 

IWENVM. ANLMOS. MONVMENTVM. SIBI. DELIGENS. 

TANTI. VIRI. EFFIGIES. VOBIS. HIC. EST. PROPOSITA. 

CORPVS. SVB. ALTARI. CONQVLESCIT. 

ANIMA. IN. SVAM. SEDEM. PATRE. VOCANTE. IMMIGRAVIT. 

PORTIS. PIA. LMTA.. 

NAT. A. D. XIII. JVN. MDCCXCV. MORT. A. D. XH. JVN. MDCCCXLH. 

AMICI. POSVERVNT. 

The windows of the Chapel are of painted glass. 
One of them in commemoration of Dr. Thomas 
Arnold, is touching in its design. It represents 
the meeting of the Saviour and Thomas, with the 
words inscribed beneath, " And Jesus said unto 
him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me thou hast 
believed ; blessed are they who have not seen, and 
yet have believed." These are said to have been 
among his last words. Under another memorial 
window there is a plate of brass inscribed with the 
names of Rugby scholars who fell at the Crimea. 
Everywhere in school, and church, and domestic 
fireside, the martial ardor of the youth of England 
is nourished. The beautiful death of those who 
die for their country was one of Arnold's favorite 
themes. We do not stop now to speak of this 
peculiar trait of English Christianity, that it min- 
gles the heroism of the earthly and spiritual soldier, 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COW PER. 93 

and blends their glories as it were in one. But 
here the true soldier of Christ lies on the field of 
his glory. Arnold is buried near the pulpit, 
where he so often preached in living earnestness 
and power to fresh young minds. He pointed 
them directly to Christ. He dropt the worn-out 
robes of dogmatism, ecclesiasticism, pietism, and 
stretched out the arms of love, truth, hope, to the 
young. The words of Dr. Arnold's favorite morn- 
ing hymn, from the German of Baron von Canitz, 
are expressive of his life : — 

" Come, my soul, thou must be waking, 
Now is breaking 

O'er the earth another day; 
Come to Him who made this splendor, 
See thou render 

All thy feeble powers can pay. 

From the stars thy course be learning ; 
Dimly burning, 

'Neath the sun their light grows pale ; 
So let all that sense delighted, 
While benighted 

From God's presence fade and fail." 

Olney, in the county of Buckingham, or 
u Bucks," as it is called, is situated in the marshy 
valley of the slow-winding river Ouse, as if it 
had been formerly the bed of a wide and shallow 
lake. Long before arriving I saw the spire of 
John Newton's Church, frequently referred to by 
Cowper as a grateful way-mark in his weary pil- 
grimage. It is the only salient feature of the 
otherwise flat and melancholy scene. The town 
itself, of about five thousand inhabitants, is on 



94 OLD ENGLAND. 

very slightly rising ground, with the river run- 
ning, rather sleeping, at its side. Two bridges, 
or one bridge in two parts, cross its wide 
undefined bed, for it seems to have no particular 
current at this spot, but generally diffuses itself 
around in stagnant ponds and pools. It was not 
the river to rush through a poet's brain, and 
cleanse it of its unhealthy fancies. The very 
bridge this over which the Postman of the " Task" 
came thundering and tooting, — 

" That with its wearisome but needful length, 
Bestrides the wintry flood." 

I drove directly to Cowper's house, a tall red-brick 
mansion, with stripes of black brick, and under 
each window an ornament of carved stone-work. 
It was the most presentable house in town, and 
stood at the angle of a triangle formed by the 
meeting of three roads. In the square or open 
place itself was one large tree, which must have 
flourished in the poet's time. The house seems 
to be now cut up into two or three dwellings. Its 
roof also has been altered, being made a plain 
shelving roof, whereas it had formerly been a bold 
parapeted one. The front room, which was Cow- 
per's sitting-room, is now used as a milliner's shop, 
and is filled with bonnets and caps. The amiable 
mistress of the shop did the honors of the house, 
seeming to have an appreciation of Cowper. The 
room is very small, with bay windows ; Cowper's 
bedroom is smaller still. In these rooms the 
" Task " was probably written, for it was com- 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 95 

posed .mostly in the winter time. Here also lie 
kept his hares, Puss, Bess, and Tiny. We might 
see a faint smile pass over his sad face, when he 
wrote of the veteran survivor of the famous 
three : — 

" Though duly from my hand he took 
His pittance every night, 
He did it with a jealous look, 
And when he could would bite." 

The garden is now disjoined from the house, but 
still exists in about its ancient size and integrity. 
Its present owner is a hospitable, open-hearted 
man, who entertained me with fruit and luncheon 
in Cowper's own garden-house. This is getting 
rickety, but still stands. Cowper wrote here much 
that bears his name, and this same little summer- 
house has its own place in the map of human 
freedom ! Here he used to sit in conversation 
with his friend John Newton late into the night. 
Newton's house is just beyond the garden, over a 
narrow field that the poet called his " guinea 
orchard," having purchased a right of way to his 
friend's house for a guinea a year. I walked 
through this field to the parsonage. Newton's 
study- window looked directly down upon this 
meadow. Under this roof these two pure spirits 
held sweet counsel together, and in many ways 
important results have flowed from their apparent- 
ly accidental friendship. To Newton's influence 
the world probably owes Cowper's poetic works. 
From that eleven years' imprisonment in the house 



96 OLD ENGLAND. 

of bondage, flowed forth the sweetest spiritual 
songs in the English language. Newton's house 
is now occupied as a vicarage, as it was formerly. 
The present young vicar of Olney showed us 
Newton's study, an attic-room, ornamented with 
Scripture texts painted in large letters on the 
walls. I crossed over also to the church. The 
yard and the church itself appeared neglected. It 
looked like an earthly rather than a spiritual 
sheep-fold. Newton's pulpit still stands. With 
what feelings must he have given out some touch- 
ing tender words from the " Olney Hymns," with 
that almost ever- vacant seat before him ! 

I called upon a very venerable lady of the name 
of Mason, living near Cowper's house, who re- 
members to have seen the poet when she was a 
little girl, and was frequently at his residence. 
She said " he was a good man, but quite, quite 
reserved." She showed me a poker which he in- 
vented for his friend Sir John Throckmorton. 
She said very simply, that "if we were good 
enough to go to heaven we would meet William 
Cowper there." 

I drove over to another well-known home of 
Cowper, about two miles distant, " Weston Under- 
wood." He removed from Olney to this place on 
account of its greater healthiness, and to be nearer 
the Throckmortons. The house called " The 
Lodge " is a superior house to the one at Olney. 
It was wreathed over with a luxuriant vine, and 
seemed to be a comfortable mansion. On account 



HOMES OF ARNOLD AND COWPER. 97 

of the illness of the lady of the house, I did not 
see the chamber where the poet has left some 
desponding lines, written in pencil on the inside 
of the window-shutter, dated July 22d, 1795. I 
carried away a branch of the yew-tree standing in 
the garden. A walk in '* The Wilderness," near 
by, brought to mind the poet more vividly than 
any spot I had seen. It was the most of genuine 
Nature that he enjoyed. It is a thick luxuriant 
copse-wood left apparently just as when Cowper 
was living. At the end of a shadowy walk stands 
the bust of Homer with the Greek inscription. 
Here are the monuments to the " pointer," and 
the spaniel " Fop." An old white decaying acacia 
in front of the arbor seemed like his own leafless 
spirit, seared by mental disease, but kept from 
dying by the invisible stream of a divine faith, so 
that it now stands transplanted, putting forth 
leaves and blossoms on the border of the River of 
Life. Here also is the favorite lime-tree walk, and 
beyond this, in the depths of the Park, is the 
famous "Yardley Oak." So thick is the shade 
in " the Wilderness," and so perfect the quiet, 
that no words would better fit the place than those 
of his own simple hymn : — 

" The calm retreat, the silent shade, 
With praj^er and praise agree, 
And seem by thy sweet bounty made, 
For those who follow thee. 



" There, if thy spirit touch the soul, 
And grace her mean abode, 
7 



98 OLD ENGLAND. 

Oh with what peace, and joy, and love, 
She communes with her God. 

" There, like a nightingale, she pours 
Her solitary lays, 
Nor asks a witness of her song, 
Nor thirsts for human praise." 



CHAPTER VI. 

WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 

I made (to myself) an unexpected discovery in 
Weston Underwood, of the house where Dr. 
Thomas Scott once lived. Taking in Turvey, a 
little way from Olney, where was Leigh Rich- 
mond's home after he left the Isle of Wight, and 
much of interest, in the history of English faith, 
is comprised within this circle of ten miles. New- 
ton, Richmond, Cowper, Scott, — do you call them 
the representatives of a type of religion that in 
some respects was narrow, and is now undergo- 
ing changes ? But they were the faithful of their 
day — a day in which scholarship in the illustra- 
tion of divine truth was at a low ebb. Dr. Scott's 
house stands at the head of the principal street of 
the village. An intelligent and cultivated family 
now occupy it. It is not the large thatched-roofed 
cottage diagonally opposite, which Hugh Miller sup- 
posed it was. It is strange that so accurate an ob- 
server should have made this mistake. It arose 
probably from hearing it said that the cottage was 
formerly the parsonage. But Scott clearly defines 
the situation of his house in his Autobiography. In 
a front chamber of this house he wrote his " Com- 



100 OLD ENGLAND. 

mentaries." In the garden stands the same pear- 
tree (a wall-tree covering nearly all of one end of 
the house) to which he refers in his Autobiography. 
" In fact Mr. H." (his landlord) " took no rent of 
me but a hamper of pears, annually, from a fine 
tree in the garden, for which he regularly sent me 
a receipt." Cowper, in a letter to John Newton, 
speaks of " Mr. Scott as an admirable preacher, 
but one who was apt to spoil his sermons by " scold- 
ing" too much. The stone church where Dr. 
Scott preached is not far from the house, a solid 
structure containing monuments of the Throckmor- 
ton family. This was a Catholic family, and 
strange to say, in the village where Scott and 
Cowper lived, most of the inhabitants at this day 
are Catholic. 

That genial though thorough Englishman, " Ar- 
thur Helps," has made the remark that tempera- 

"tjment is but the atmosphere of character, while its 
groundwork in nature may be fixed and unchange- 
able. This remark might explain the difference 
between the Englishman and the American, look- 
ing at both in their broad national traits. It has 
been pleasant to me to think that deep down under 
all the changes of history and circumstance, there 
was a common root to the two nations, and that 
this still is to be found. The temperament of the 
American, since his ancestors landed in New Eng- 

** land and Virginia, has been affected by a thousand 
new influences. More oxygen has flowed into his 
soul as well as his lungs. His nature has been in- 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 101 

tensified. His sympathies have found another 
rano-e of objects. But, after all, it is hard to wash 
away the original basis of nature. Its force and in- 
tegrity remain. What can be more different than 
a genuine Yankee and a true John Bull ? Yes, we 
can say they are no longer the same ; but still they £ 
do not differ as an Englishman differs from a 
Frenchman, or a German, or an Italian. Many 
unchangeable qualities belong to each, though 
transformed. I have an American friend in view, 
a traveling acquaintance, who has the distinctive 
American traits in broad relief; and I should be 
perfectly willing to show him the following photo- 
graph. He would recognize it, laugh at it, and 
glory in it. He worshiped his own country. He 
meant that everybody else should know how great £ 
it is. There was nothing that America did not 
have ; there was nothing in fact out of America. 
He hated an Englishman because the Englishman g 
would not acknowledge the same thing. He was 
ready to fight England, just to make her wake up, 
and open her eyes, and see the "living truth" 
about America. But if he hated an Englishman, 
he had an infinite contempt for a Swiss, because he 
considered him to be mercenary and not to be de- 
pended upon. In going over some of the wilder 
passes of the Alps, although he had a horse so that 
he might not appear to be mean, he would not 
mount the horse until his guide happened to ask 
him if he were afraid ; then he jumped on, and rode 
unconcernedly along the edge of the most terrific 



102 OLD ENGLAND. 

abysses, where every one else dismounted. He 
told me that he had never had a sensation of fear 
in his life, and I believe him, for Jhe would climb 
places where few would dare to follow him, and 
then go " a touch beyond," and dangle his legs over 
the precipice. He took a guide rather as a matter 
of course, for he always found the path himself, and 
walked ahead. He filled his pockets with small 
change every morning, to be distributed to all the 
little children he met during the day, but he would 
raise the hotel when he thought himself cheated to 
the value of a ten-centime piece. He was a rich 
man, and had made himself. When he had just 
begun business he discovered by reweighing an 
article that he had charged a customer a dollar too 
much. He went immediately and rectified the 
mistake. His customer, an old Quaker gentleman, 
said to him, " Young man, thee shall never be the 
poorer for that dollar." "And that dollar," he 
said, " had brought him thousands." Every thing 
new, useful, and practical, he swooped upon in- 
stantly. He spoke little about the Alps, but a new 
style of bolt running upon rollers, which he found 
in Switzerland, he was much interested in, though 
he said he had the same idea himself when a boy. 
Stone stairs, in case of fire, was the only thing I 
ever heard him acknowledge as something pecu- 
liarly foreign and good. He did not like any thing 
©because it was old, and despised a "battered old 
torso " ; but if a work of Art looked nice and beau- 
tiful at the present instant, whether new or old, he 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 103 

indulged in vehement praises of it. The past was 
past with him. A thing must be entirely up to its 
professions, for the slightest respect on his part. 
He affected to scorn sentiment and the emotional, 
but he was ever doing little delicate and kind 
things. I discovered accidentally this iron-nerved 
man, who prided himself on his sang-froid, gazing 
with bedewed eyes on the miniature of his dead 
wife, that he had caused to be painted in the most 
exquisite manner by Lamuni&re of Geneva, and set 
about with enamels of forget-me-nots in a casing of 
massive gold. 

Whatever he bought, or wore, or ate, or had, 
must be of the best quality, and he put himself on 
a lower seat to no living being. 

Now in many things, although absolutely trans- 
formed, do we not see here the original English 
nature, — its self-confidence, uprightness, courage, 
practicalness, acquisitiveness, womanish tenderness, 
and insufferable pride ? He disliked an Englishman 
for the same reason that an Englishman disliked 
him. But is there not here, in better things, a 
ground of future union of the two nations to civil- 
ize the world ? They both have the same English 
" pluck." There is in both nations the same love 
of home, the same capacity of religion. They are 
nations that do have a conscience. Therefore they 
are better, and worse, and greater, than other na- 
tions. A far more strongly marked comparison 
might be drawn between the Englishman and the 
German. They too are not mentally or morally 



104 OLD ENGLAND. 

antagonistic, as are the English and French, but 
only, as the Englishman and the American, tem- 
peramentally dissimilar. The chief feature of dis- 
similarity consists in the practical directness of the 
^English mind, as compared with the thoughtful cir- 
cuitousness of the German. This comes out amus- 
ingly in conversation. The German dwells on par- 
ticulars while tenaciously pursuing the main track ; 
is minute and episodical ; must examine every stone, 
and turn over every straw, and does not perceive, 
or does not wish to do so, the few things of true im- 
portance. The Englishman goes to the other ex- 
treme in brevity ; marches immediately to the con- 
clusion ; disdains the intermediate ; relates a fact 
and gives a reason without obscuring either in un- 
essential detail. But a German who wishes to say 
" I went home from the Post-office," would feel 
obliged to tell every corner he turned around, 
every person he met, every thing that every person 
told him, and every thing that he told every person. 
It is sometimes, therefore, a small torture for an 
Englishman or an American to talk with a Ger- 
man, because the definite fact or idea which he is 
seeking for is so long in finding expression. But 
on philosophical and scientific topics, this systematic 
method and absolute thoroughness of the German 
mind is a noble feature, while English bluntness 
and American rapidity become real faults, and lead 
to intellectual superficiality. Another striking dif- 
ference between an Englishman and a German is, 
that if the former has in him anv thing like senti- 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 105 

ment, he tries to conceal it as a weakness of which 
he is heartily ashamed ; the latter delights to make 
a show of sentiment. The Englishman hates 
scenes ; the German revels in such manifestations. 
The Englishman tries to look contemptuous ; the 
German appears rapturous. The Englishman de- 
spises pipe-claying and outward manifestations ; the 
German glories in red tags and demonstrations. 
And since we are in for it, to strike out in the gen- 
uine Macaulay vein, the Englishman has an island 
solitariness of temper ; the German has a conti- 
nental sociality. The Englishman thinks more of 
himself than of his neighbor; the German thinks 
more of his neighbor than of himself. The Eng- 
lishman has more self-respect ; the German has 
more self-complacency. 

There is one quality in the English character 
patent to all observers, which is one of its least 
worthy features, — suspicion. Whether it be so 
or not, there is almost always an apparent suspi- 
cion of every thing, and of everybody, in his looks 
and conduct. He seems to be suspicious lest his 
right-hand neighbor is a thief, his left-hand neigh- 
bor an artful imposter, and the man who sits oppo- 
site him a humbug. Sometimes when one really 
supposes he is on terms of easy confidence with an 
Englishman, some trivial thing happens to rouse 
the old John Bull suspicion, and your pleasant and 
intelligent companion is instantly transformed into 
a lump of ice and formality. Perhaps the next 
time you meet him, he will either not know you, 



106 OLD ENGLAND. 

or you are so disgusted as not to know him. This 
suspicion has seemed to me sometimes to poison an 
Englishman's own happiness. I remember a little 
incident in riding from Mansfield to Chesterfield 
through the Robin Hood forest region. The 
weather was good, the roads smooth, and all the 
company seemed to be in excellent spirits. Two 
burly gentlemen in front of me took an especial 
liking to each other, and chatted, and joked, and 
laughed, till the groves and orchards rang again. 
Something, however, jarred suddenly in their con- 
versation, the English suspicion seemed to creep up 
into their faces, they looked at each other askance, 
the conversation dropped, each buttoned up his 
top-coat, settled himself in his seat, and one felt 
that if any thing more occurred between the two, it 
would be to pitch each other off the coach. This 
little circumstance had an evident effect upon the 
whole company. Each one seemed to be reminded 
that he, too, had been too free with his neighbor 
with whom he had no previous acquaintance. It 
was in vain after this to attempt to raise a conver- 
sation, and rain coming on, the discomfort and 
wetting confirmed this unsociability for the rest of 
the ride, into downright savage taciturnity. 

On arriving at an English inn, apparently the 
same chill suspicion meets one. A prim landlady 
receives the traveler and consigns him immediately 
to the laconic offices of " Boots." He is shut up 
alone in a sombre-looking parlor ; is obliged to ring, 
and ring, and ring, for the most common and in- 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 107 

dispensable services ; eats his dinner alone and in 
silence ; and when he leaves is besieged by the inso- 
lent demands of three or four understrappers, to 
whom he is not aware of having been indebted for 
any assistance. But the trim and pleasant-looking 
landlady appears again at this moment of departure, 
with the invariable courteous commonplace, " I 
hope you have passed an agreeable time, sir ! ' 

I have indeed sometimes amused myself with 
the idea, that a traveler entering an English inn 
is looked upon in the light of an intruder upon a 
private family circle. He can get little informa- 
tion by asking questions ; is expected to keep his 
own room, to make as little noise as possible, and 
give as little trouble. In traveling in England, 
one meets with few pleasant personal adventures, 
because it is rare that an Englishman suffers you to 
assist him, or suffers himself to be interested in you. 
I asked an educated Englishman once what was 
the reason of this. He said it was English phlegm. 
John Bull would n't absolutely take the trouble to 
ask questions or answer them, to sympathize with 
others, or to strive to win others' sympathies. He 
prefers to sit still and tranquilly digest his plum- 
pudding. It is hard for a genuine Englishman to 
meet a stranger, as a Frenchman does, on the neu- 
tral platform of well-bred indifference. He must 
either be cool or hearty, suspicious or all- confiding. 
I have found in traveling in England that if I 
could chastise my own intemperate nationality, 
and not let it stick out offensively, that I soon made 



108 OLD ENGLAND. 

friends with Englishmen, who, in the end, would 
volunteer more in reference to their own failings 

£j> than I should ever have thought of producing to 
them. Mutual pride prevents Englishmen and 
Americans from seeing each others' good traits 
and positive resemblances. And all Englishmen 
are not disagreeable, neither are all Americans in- 
sufferable. There are the pleasantest and sweetest 
people in the world in both nations ; so there are 
undoubtedly the most insolent and contemptible. 
I remember one evening at Bath occupying the 
coffee-room with one of the most agreeable men I 
ever met. He was not only a cultivated man, and 
one too who did not despise an American book, and 
who lived daily with our best authors and poets, 
Ibut he was an Englishman who had no prejudices 
against us as a people, and where he disagreed with 
us did so in a manly way. He was a genial man, 
open as the day. He was a Christian man, not 
dry or solemn, but the heart of the true Christian, 
the fighter against all wrong and meanness, was in 
him. His spirit met your spirit in love. So free 
and pleasant was our talk, that it was near one 
o'clock before w T e parted. During the evening, an- 
other man had taken his dinner in the same room. 
While we were conversing upon the Crimean war, 

* he had joined in the conversation. I could not 
make out what he was. He was neither decidedly 
military nor decidedly clerical. He might have 
held some civil post in the army. He was coarse, 
and there was something about him that did not 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 109 

speak the gentleman. My friend thought differ- 
ently. He supposed that a campaign in the East 
might have roughened him. But the next morn- 
ing he came into the room, ordered the waiter in a 
peremptory manner, ate his meal in sullen silence, 
and neither in coming in nor going out, although 
we had talked together the night before, did he 
make the slightest sign of recognition. After he 
had disappeared, my companion raised both hands, 
pronouncing the awful sentence, " Snobus est ! " 
In the same way one is continually encountering 
people of different characters, and of all shades of 
character. One man is obliging and another rude. 
,,We should surely not forget the many agreeable 
people we meet, when we think of the opposite 
ones. In traveling in other countries, I have for 
many days, and even weeks, been thrown in com- 
pany with English persons of rank, occupying neigh- 
boring rooms, sitting at the same table, taking the 
same rounds in walking and riding. Some of them 
have possessed the faculty of ignoring the pres- 
ence of other beings, though in an unexception- 
able way ; of not seeing when looking ; and of giv- 
ing to perfection the u stony British stare." But 
others have good-humoredly resigned themselves to 
what they may have considered the force of circum- 
stances, and consented to recognize, on the neutral 
ground of good society, those about them who were 
respectable and intelligent. Should we go away 
and say that all the English nobility are proud and 
supercilious ? Perhaps there might be even hidden 



110 OLD ENGLAND. 

reasons of considerable weight, why common po- 
liteness and kindness of heart should not be mani- 
fested to all, if felt, though it were hard to see 
this. For myself, whenever I have had the good 
fortune and skill to open the English oyster, I have 
rarely failed of finding a pearl. Dr. Bushnell was 
about right when he said, that you must break an 
Englishman's head and walk in, and you would find 
most excellent accommodations. 

We were traveling in the neighborhood of 
Woodstock. The road here, whether over hill 
or through dale, was bordered by the invariable 
hedge-rows, and the fields divided by the same. 
Yet even the English hedge is said to be getting 
into disrepute among the farmers, because it takes 
up valuable ground, and nests so many predatory 
little birds. But may the English hedge never 
give way. It has a beauty higher than any spirit 
of utility. It is a blossoming, tangled conglomera- 
tion of briar, rose, and thorn, impervious to any 
thing but an English fox-hunter's rush. The 
Hawthorn, or White-thorn, is the chief basis of an 
English hedge. Its thick, luxuriant foliage is of a 
rich dark green, and its blossom is of pure white, 
whose delicate perfume in the months of May and 
June, comes on every breeze over the fields, — • 

" The milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale." 

But every other kind of blooming running thing 
mixes up with it, the Wild Rose, the Blackberry 
with its colored flowers, the Stone Bramble, the 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. HI 

spiky-leaved Holly, the common Raspberry, the 
bright-green Buckthorn, and the Hazel, whose long 
tassels, or catkins, are the first blossoms of sprincr. 
All these left to grow and twine together, on a 
sacred ridge, one might say for centuries, then we 
get the English hedge, — to be seen only however 
in its perfection in the South of England, in Dev- 
onshire, or the Isle of Wight. Bloom on centuries 
more, sweet English hedge ! 

From Mr. Everett's description I had mustered 
up very splendid visions in regard to Blenheim. 
They were not entirely realized. The gardens 
were lovely, they might be called magnificent; 
but the park and grounds for miles around looked 
deserted and uncared for. The water of the arti- 
ficial lake lay in broad, stagnant pools, the home 
of bitterns, piping frogs, and mosquitoes. The im- 
mense palace itself of yellow limestone was rusty 
and begrimed. It had a vast, faded splendor, but 
never could have had architecturally a very im- 
pressive character. It is heavy and strained. Of 
the interior, the Library is by far the finest room, 
having a length of 183 feet. A statue of Queen 
Anne stands at one end. The " great Duke," with 
his hooked nose and decided mouth, like a later 
but better great duke, figures everywhere upon 
miles of canvas and fresco. He drove six marshals 
of France out of the field, but could not write the 
English language correctly. The tomb of Marl- 
borough in the chapel has no particular meaning or 
point. It is a huge, cold, and pompous pile. A 



112 OLD ENGLAND. 

modern finely carved pulpit, of one piece of Derby- 
shire spar, was by far the best thing in the Chapel. 
Marble and paint, and we have seen Blenheim, the 
great Duke's show-place, built for him by the Eng- 
lish nation at the cost of half a million pounds ster- 
ling! 

Just by the side of the Triumphal-gate of Blen- 
heim Park, stood once the house of Chaucer. The 
gentleman who lives upon the spot allowed me to 
see his garden, and what very little remained of 
the poet's house. He told me that he himself took 
down what there was of it to construct his own 
dwelling ; preserving, however, two or three small 
arched windows which he built into a wall. He 
possessed an original title-deed of Chaucer's in re- 
lation to this very house. 

Woodstock is a gone-by little town, contented to 
sleep under the shadow of the Duke of Marl- 
borough's wings. It makes buckskin gloves and 
tippets. It is on the south or opposite side of the 
stream upon which old Woodstock stood, the scene 
of Scott's novel. The palace has entirely disap- 
peared. 

By one of the few remaining stage-routes, I rode 
from Oxford to Cheltenham, about forty miles. It 
was good to sit by an old-fashioned English coach- 
man, and behind a team of well-matched nags. A 
ringing, musical gallop was indulged in down a 
gentle plane ; and as we drew up to some lonely 
" Barley-mow " hostlery, the horses reeked with 
smoke in the morning air. Not long after crossing 



WESTON UNDERWOOD TO CHELTENHAM. 113 

the Isis, and leaving Oxford, we came into the 
neighborhood of Cumnor Hall. From the simple 
ballad that begins with a picture of the moonlight 
shining on the towers and oaks of this ancient 
place, Scott was inspired to become a poet. 

We passed by one of the new cemeteries es- 
tablished according to a recent act of Parliament, 
requiring all burial-places to be outside of towns. 
The yards belonging to the Established Church 
and the Dissenters were separated by a high wall, 
and were made as distinct as possible. Can it be 
that such divisions are carried up to the tomb's 
mouth ? 

The town of Witney, famous for its blankets, 
but now gone rather to decline, lay upon our 
route. It has a fine old church in the early Eng- 
lish style. This, and Burford, presented the usual 
features of small inland English towns, — one wide 
street of sober low stone houses, more picturesque 
than neat, with frequent open butchers' stalls, and 
now and then an inn sign, with somewhat more 
of bustle about the inn door than elsewhere. 
Shortly after leaving Burford, and before coming 
to Northleach, we left Oxfordshire and entered 
Gloucestershire. Our ride was through a farming 
and grazing country, a region celebrated for its 
wool-raising. There is a notion that one kind of 
land makes good mutton and another good wool. 
In the farm-yards, with their high stone walls, 
stood immense symmetric straw-ricks, partially 
cut, and as precisely as a wedding-cake. Great. 



114 OLD ENGLAND. 

differences in the neatness of yard, and house, and 
fields, were observable here, as in other countries. 
All the farmers were not thrifty, as all doubtless 
were not intelligent. Before reaching Cheltenham 
we drove over a very high range of country, com- 
manding fine prospects into the vales of Evesham, 
Tewksbury, and Worcester, even as far as the 
Malvern Hills. This is said to be an exceedingly 
bleak and storm-swept region in winter. At Chel- 
tenham I stopped at the ancient " Plough Inn," 
now a fashionable and luxurious hotel. 



CHAPTER VII. 

CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 

Cheltenham, on the river Chelt, under the 
Cotswold hills, is a well-grown city of some 40,000 
inhabitants. It is one of those peculiar English 
towns where our serious " Motherlanders " gather 
themselves together to enjoy and display their 
wealth in fine equipages, elegant assemblies, and a 
nice union of gayety with comfort. It is not one 
of those migratory and butterfly watering-places 
that shines for a month or so ; but it is a place 
where people have a good time all winter long, 
where they live in their own substantial stone 
villas. I was in Cheltenham at the dull season, 
and the heat was oppressive. The Assembly 
Rooms, and Pump Rooms, and the spacious orna- 
mental grounds at Pittville, were all in the highest 
condition of neatness, but quite solitary and de- 
serted. The pleasantest incident in my visit was 
the privilege of seeing Lord Northwick's immense 
collection of paintings at Thirlestane House, before 
it was scattered. It was like visiting one of the 
public galleries of the Continent. It is marvelous 
how one man's purse, and one man's will, and one 
man's life, could have brought together so many 



116 OLD ENGLAND. 

precious works of Art. Few kings have had such a 
collection. With some trash, the gallery abounded 
in original works of the great masters. Titians, 
Van Dycks, Raphaels, Rubenses, were plentiful. 
The portrait of the Duke d'Urbino, taken in a 
common dress trimmed with fur, and a black hat, 
is one of Raphael's finest pictures. It has large 
animated eyes, and is full of life. If he had not 
painted the Transfiguration, the Sistine Madonna, 
and the School of Athens, Raphael would have 
been immortal by his portraits. How manly and 
honest they are ! The gloomy and imaginative 
picture of Salvator Rosa, called u L'Umana Fragi- 
lata," was one of the glories of the collection. 
Even in Italy there is no more characteristic or 
powerful specimen of this painter's genius. The 
coloring is deep, with strong contrasts. Life and 
death seem to mingle in the picture. There was 
an odd but vigorous picture of " Jacob and the 
Mandrakes," by Murillo. I noticed also a highly 
finished " St. Jerome," by Albert Diirer, and a 
"St. John," full of feeling, by Guido. There 
were two very beautiful Claudes, one of them a 
sunset. There were many noble paintings of the 
Spanish school. The older Flemish and German 
masters were fully represented. The collection 
was rich in Cuyps ; but especially in Ruysdaels. 
One might there have been convinced, if not 
before, of the power of this last painter. He 
gives the rush of torrents, the movement of rivers, 
the grandeur of rock and precipice, the still-life 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 117 

in the depth of forests, the aspects of unchanged 
Nature, with unequaled freshness and boldness. 
Though all the great modern artists seemed to be 
present in their familiar works, I did not see a 
single Turner. Perhaps the old lord, who died 
at eight y- nine, and who was whimsically inde- 
pendent and fastidious in his taste, would not give 
in in his old age to Turner and Ruskin, but re- 
mained true to his Claudes, and Gainsboroughs, 
and sweet old English landscapes. We saw the 
little desk where he was accustomed to sit, with 
two small pictures of a church aisle, and of an old 
beggar's head hanging over it. His life was un- 
doubtedly lengthened through his love of Art. He 
lived in his gallery ; and when he could find any 
one like-minded, who would walk with him through 
the rooms, he would pour out immense erudition 
in relation to Art and artists. But he was willing 
to explain his pictures to the common laborer and 
the child, and to instruct all in the method of com- 
prehending and studying paintings. He left no 
will ; and his intentions in regard to this vast col- 
lection were not then certainly known. But these 
choice paintings, these cases of historical gems, 
these bronzes, marbles and cameos, these thousand 
objects which to the smallest of them bore the 
stamp of mind, were to be separated, some of them 
perhaps finding their way back to their native 
shores. They were soon afterward sold at public 
sale, and found purchasers, if I am rightly in- 
formed, from many different lands. One hardly 



118 OLD ENGLAND. 

sees what great purpose such a stupendous gallery, 
formed at such cost and care, and suddenly falling 
into its ten thousand original parts, could have 
answered. If it were merely for the enjoyment 
of one man it looks selfish. But doubtless many 
English artists have received here their first in- 
spiration ; and in a quiet way it may have served 
to mould and refine the taste of the land. 

In a small stone mansion at Cheltenham, called 
the " Georgiana Villa," Lord Byron, it is said, 
composed the " Corsair." He did not do it sitting 
in a stalactite cavern in one of the rockv isles of 
Greece, as Byron-mad youth might imagine. But 
if the noble lord had gone to his own Sherwood 
Forest, or to the Malvern Hills near by, or over 
the Severn into rocky, legendary Monmouth, or 
along the bold and romantic shores of Devonshire, 
he would have found a much better English hero, 
and as lovely scenery. 

Among the pleasant drives about Cheltenham, 
one may visit the fountain-head of the Thames, 
on the road to Birdlip. It is a small pond of very 
clear and sweet water, shaded with trees. Here is 
the meeting of seven springs. 

Let us now, without going through the details 
of the journey, find ourselves in Bristol, a dirty 
old business city, but with aristocratic suburbs, and 
not without some interest to the stranger in itself. 
In the ancient church of St. Mary RadclifFe, situ- 
ated in a still and deserted quarter of Bristol, one 
finds more architectural riches than in the Cathe- 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 119 

dral, which is chiefly interesting as containing the 
monument of Bishop Butler, that most massive of 
reasoners, who marked out for all time the affinities 
between religion and the constitution and course 
of Nature. The inscription upon the monument 
was written by Southey. The exterior of St. Mary 
Radcliffe is extremely worn and black, but its inte- 
rior is one of the finest examples of the pure Per- 
pendicular Gothic that there is in England. An 
intenser interest attaches to it as the place where 
young Chatterton wrought his wondrous literary 
forgery. I climbed the narrow stone stairs of one 
of the transept towers, so often bounded up by the 
feet of Chatterton on his stealthy and mysterious 
errand, and entered the small open-windowed and 
many-sided room, where are still the two old chests 
in which he pretended to have found the Rowley 
manuscripts. The windows look out over the city, 
with its red roofs, and many hollows, hills, and ir- 
regularities. From this strange and lofty study, 
open to the air and birds of heaven, how often did 
he look down on the toiling city, feeling himself 
entirely cut off from all that glowing human life. 
It was singular to be alone in the room where that 
young and restless mind worked so intensely upon 
a lie ! Having once conceived the idea as a flash 
of fancjr, did he not almost begin to believe it him- 
self, and really to live in that old world of romance 
and battle ? Would that then he could have had 
one true friend of genuine heart and wisdom. If 
Southey or Coleridge had been living, instead of 



120 OLD ENGLAND. 

Horace Walpole, how different would have been 
the event. The chests are rough affairs, and the 
liveliest imagination cannot make any thing more 
of them than old coal -boxes. They are now much 
decayed, though some large nails still remain in 
them. But they are more like rough troughs than 
those carefully made and iron-bound " chestes" in 
which precious things were anciently deposited. 

Chatterton, it is said, would roam in the fields 
about Bristol the whole Sabbath long, and lie 
stretched on the grass gazing at the tower of old 
St. Mary's Church. He preferred to write, it is 
said, by moonlight. He was but seventeen years 
and nine months old when he died. 

Broadmead Chapel is situated at the opposite 
extreme of the city from the Church of St. Mary 
Radcliffe, and is outside of the old walls. It is in 
the commercial, or sailor quarter of the city. I 
approached it by a long back street lined with little 
shops for the sale of old clothes, old iron, ship fur- 
niture, etc., and sprinkled freely with tap-rooms, 
decorated with their red-baize curtains. Nothing 
in particular indicated the fact of a church, but a 
little notice upon the door of a block of houses. 
The portress admitted me into the chapel through 
some low entries ; and it seemed to be a room situ- 
ated between two streets, and all about it was so 
filled in with houses and shops, that no one would 
suspect that there was such a chapel there. It is 
itself a small church, capable of seating perhaps at 
the largest estimate five hundred people, and as 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 121 

plain as plain could be. There were three pillars 
on a side, supporting low galleries. A black iron 
chandelier hung in the centre. The pulpit was of 
painted wood, and clamped together, where it had 
been broken, with common iron bands. It had no 
ornament of any kind. And here preached the 
prince of preachers, Robert Hall. The visit would 
have done any one good. It taught both humility 
and hope. Here a great genius was content to 
labor for his Master. The place does not make a 
man small or great. A little marble slab, on the 
wall by the side of the pulpit, bore three inscrip- 
tions to three ministers of the chapel. The middle 
one was in these words : " The Rev. Robt. Hall, 
A. M. Pastor of this church 5 years. Died 21st 
Feb'y 5 1831, aged 66." I went into the vestry 
where he used to retire after preaching, to throw 
himself upon a bench in perfect agony. It was the 
merest miniature of a room. In an adjoining 
apartment hang the portraits of Robert Hall, John 
Foster, and other distinguished Baptist ministers. 
The elderly woman, looking upon his portrait, 
(which represents him as leaning on his desk, and 
simply raising his hand from the Bible,) said, " I 
remember Mr. Hall very well, and that was all the 
gesture he made." But Robert Hall could not be 
hid any more than a mountain. His strength lay 
in the solidity of his intellect. The intellectual 
element predominated. His mighty mind pene- 
trated by the pure weight of thought to the depths 
of subjects. There was joined to this a vast power 



122 OLD ENGLAND. 

of moral feeling and of burning indignation against 
all untruth. He apprehended clearly the far-off and 
most distant results of wrong opinions, and this made 
him the greatest moral reasoner of his age. What 
great trains of thought run in expanding light 
through his magnificent argument on Modern Infi- 
delity ! And how marvelously his style blends the 
totally opposite qualities of simplicity and splendor 
of diction ! 

I was fortunate while in Bristol in hearing that 
remarkable " man of God," — I can think of no 
better name, — George Miiller, who built the Or- 
phan Houses at Ashley Down. The life of this 
primitive Christian is well known in America. He 
was born in Prussia in 1805. While a student in 
the University of Halle, he made the acquaintance 
of a body of warm-hearted and active Christian 
disciples. He devoted himself from that time to 
preaching and doing good. He came to England 
in 1829 to apply to the Continental Missionary So- 
ciety to be sent as a missionary to the East. He 
preached for some time at Teignmouth, living upon 
the small voluntary contributions of his friends. 
He was a man of child-like faith, who practically 
believed in the power of pra}^er and the Father- 
hood of God. He was frequently brought down 
to the lowest extremity. He and a Scotch friend, 
Mr. Craik, removed to Bristol, establishing there a 
little preaching chapel, which in its temporal affairs 
was to exist on the same principle of trust in God. 
He was led to do something for poor children, and 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 123 

to found an institution for giving them a religious 
education ; and he commenced this plan of benevo- 
lence when he and his friend were actually reduced 
to a single shilling. For the pressing wants of 
himself and the poor children he made particular 
prayers, and seemed to be supplied just enough for 
every day. He established in this way a " Script- 
ural Knowledge Institution " as it was called, and 
afterward the larger " Orphan Houses." This 
last establishment has been supported entirely by 
free-will offerings. At some junctures there would 
not be a half-penny in the hands of the matrons of 
the houses, to provide the children bread. Yet 
Miiller would not borrow, and some providential 
event, or gift, would carry him around the point, 
into smoother waters. He personally applied to no 
one for assistance, but it flowed in upon him, as he 
asserted, and who will deny it, through the power 
of prayer. He had received, up to 1858, £147,- 
667, had built substantial and spacious buildings for 
his Institution, and had nourished and taken care 
of more than a thousand orphan children. This is 
a singular tale, and I trust that no one who goes to 
Bristol, whether he looks upon him as an enthusiast 
or no, will forget to visit George Miiller' s Orphan 
Houses at Ashley Down. He is a thin, black- 
haired man, quiet but with flashing eyes, and in his 
gestures and expressions giving the idea of great 
energy. His little children, and their instructors, 
in neat dresses, were present, in the plain, Quaker- 
like church. 



124 OLD ENGLAND. 

There are twenty-nine churches in England en- 
titled to be called Cathedrals. Perhaps it would 
not be out of place, for the benefit of young read- 
ers, to name them. They are Bangor, Bath 
Priory, Bristol ; Canterbury, Carlisle, Chester, 
Chichester ; Durham ; Ely, Exeter ; Gloucester ; 
Hereford; Lichfield, Lincoln, LlandafF; Man- 
chester ; Norwich ; Oxford ; Peterborough ; Roch- 
ester ; Salisbury, St. Asaph, St. David, St. Paul's ; 
Wells, Westminster, Winchester, Worcester ; 
York. Of these, the Cathedral of Gloucester is 
neither one of the largest or smallest. It compre- 
hends the whole range of English church architect- 
ure. Begun at the latter end of the 12th century, 
and finished at the beginning of the 15th, it em- 
braces all styles. Its nave, foundations, and crypt 
are Norman, of the most solid and massive charac- 
ter. The sixteen round unornamented and ponder- 
ous columns of the nave are majestic. The repose 
of eternity seems to sleep under their shadows. The 
ancient Anglo-Saxon phrase of " God's house " is 
here well applied. It looks unchangeable. It is a 
place of rest. The stone vaulting of the ceiling is 
also simple and plain, but there is much elegant 
flower-work and tracery-work about the clere-story, 
the windows, and the western end, which were all 
later additions. This is the chief feature of 
Gloucester Cathedral, that it mingles massiveness 
and lightness, simplicity and richness. The central 
tower, which is the most modern part of the build- 
ing, is the perfection of elegance and harmony. It 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 125 

is like a full-blown rose on an oak stem. Its 
pierced and open tabernacle work, and its fretted 
clusters of graceful pinnacles, when seen at a dis- 
tance, form a rich vision. And this is one benefit 
of these great churches, that they aiford a charac- 
teristic feature to the town. They are sacred land- 
marks to every one born under their shadow. 
They are his " golden mile-posts " on the road to 
eternity. They are hailed by him when coming 
home with joy, and make his first involuntary 
thought on returning, one of God. Though we are 
apt, in America, to speak disparagingly of these 
mighty edifices of stone, supposing that they dero- 
gate from the spiritual temple, I am not disposed, 
for one, to yield up too easily an early enthusiasm 
for them. 

Gloucester Cathedral has felt the modern move- 
ment in England to restore the old churches. And 
this is chiefly apparent in the complete renovation 
of its noble cloisters, only they look too new and 
staring. They are the most perfect in England, and 
perhaps in the world. Their low-branching fan- 
tracery ceiling is like travelers' descriptions of a 
thickly arching, low bamboo forest in South Amer- 
ica. These cloisters, formerly as now, were entirely 
shut in with glass, which in ancient times was 
richly painted. They were habitable places ; and 
were not alone used for the sober walk and solitary 
musing. They were evidently employed for read- 
ing and work ; as the little adjoining monks' rooms, 
or stalls, now testify. 



126 OLD ENGLAND. 

Among the monuments in the church there is 
one of Duke Robert of Normandy, " Robert Curt- 
hose." The effigy is carved of Irish bog-oak, and 
covered with a wire net-work ; its legs are crossed, 
for he was one of the first Crusaders ; the head 
is crowned with a coronet of pearls and fleur-de-lis ; 
the body wears a chain-mail suit of armor, and his 
right hand grasps his sword, which still bears its 
ancient coloring and gilding. It is not too much to 
say that this is the likeness (if it be a likeness) of 
a remarkably handsome man. The limbs are long 
and gracefully turned, and they are by no means 
so stalwart and big as we might suppose the build 
of the strong; Norman race to have been. The 
features of the face are as regular as those of a 
young Greek warrior. There is a mournful inter- 
est attached to this monument. Robert, from 
having been a stirring, bold, ambitious prince, with 
a life full of adventure and fighting, was made 
prisoner by his brother Henry, his eyes put out, 
and for twenty-eight years he lingered in misery as 
a close prisoner in Cardiff Castle, Glamorganshire. 
He was the eldest son of the Conqueror. 

I said that the pillars of the nave were unorna- 
mented. Their capitals, however, were strung 
around with meagre but curious flower and carved 
work. Nothing is more varied than the Norman 
capital. Its shape is usually that of a bowl trun- 
cated at the sides; but its carving and ornament 
are exceedingly diverse and fanciful. Sometimes 
it is braided with interlacing lines of bead-work, as 



CHELTENHAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 127 

if hung over with a net of pearls. Sometimes it is 
wreathed with large-leaved flowers, or a stiff wide- 
spreading vine, resembling a Corinthian capital. 
At other times it is like a number of bird's-nests, 
with the birds sitting in them. Then a strange 
monster, or dragon-lizard, twists around the bell of 
the capital. Then human faces appear, sometimes 
of men holding their mouths open with their 
fingers ; and sometimes of female heads, or the 
upper half of the figures of veiled nuns inter- 
lacing their arms around the column. And I have 
been much struck with the resemblance between 
these human-headed capitals and the Isis-headed 
pillars at Denderah, and other temples in Egypt. 
Nor is the resemblance less striking between the 
common tulip-capital of the Egyptians, and one 
rather rare capital of the Norman architecture, 
which is composed of a single bell-shaped cup. 
All architecture came from the East ; and the in- 
fluence of the Byzantine style upon the Norman 
is very direct. What is Norman architecture but 
the ancient Byzantine-Roman, still farther modified 
by the gloomy and grotesque fancy of the North ? 
It has the ponderous masses and round lines of the 
older Roman edifice. Sometimes the Norman arch 
has its centre above the line of the impost, and 
then curves inward below the point of springing, 
making a perfect horseshoe arch, thus increasing 
the resemblance to Oriental buildings. The chapel 
in the White Tower in London, and the little Iffley 
church near Oxford, are among the best examples 



128 OLD ENGLAND. 

of the peculiarities of the most ancient Norman 
architecture in England. This style was intro- 
duced into Britain by William the Conqueror, and 
continued about one hundred and twenty-four 
years, to the end of the reign of Henry III., in 
1189. Then came the first true Gothic, or Early 
English style. 

Gloucester is beautifully placed in a broad valley 
on the banks of the Severn, and has just claims to 
its British name of " Caer Gloew," the " fair city.' 
It is a city which mingles largely in the early 
history of England, and was one of the twenty- 
nine principal towns of the Britons before the 
Roman invasion. It was " Colonia Glevum " of 
the Romans. Hengist, Athelstane, and the un- 
fortunate Elgiva, wife of Edwy, are said to have 
died in Gloucester. Here Edward the Confessor 
lived, and the Norman kings frequently held their 
court. Henry III. was crowned in the old Abbey 
church, and Edward II. was buried in the Cathe- 
dral. After his accession to the throne this was 
the residence of Richard of Gloucester, of whom 
Sir Thomas More wrote, — " Richarde, the thirde 
sonne of Richarde, Duke of Yorke, was in witte 
and corage eqall with his two brothers, in bodye 
and prowesse far under them both, little of stature, 
ill fetured of limmes, croke backed, his left shoulder 
much higher than his right, hard fauoured of vis- 
age, and such as in states called warlye, in other 
menne otherwise, he was malicious, wrathful, envi- 
ous, and from afore his birth ever frowarde. It is 



CHELTENPIAM, BRISTOL, AND GLOUCESTER. 129 

for trouth reported that he came into the world 
with the feete forwarde, and also ontothed, as if 
Nature chaunged her course in hys beginnynge, 
whiche in the course of his lyfe monny thinges 
vnnaturallye committed." But he adds, " none 
euill captaine was hee in warre." 

Gloucester sustained a memorable siege by the 
royal army commanded in person by Charles I. ; 
the inhabitants enduring great sufferings. It is 
likewise not without its interest in the conflicts of 
truth and religion. Here George Whitfield was 
born and preached his first sermon ; here Robert 
Raikes, in 1781, began his Sunday-school enter- 
prise, which vitalized the Christian church, and 
brought back the primitive spirit in respect to her 
fostering care of the young ; and here, above all, 
the good Bishop Hooper, one of the most illustrious 
victims of the Marian persecution, suffered martyr- 
dom near the old Minster gate, proving that he 
held a " doctrine that would abide the fire." 



CHAPTER VIII. 

WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 

For those who are traveling about England, and 
are of necessity left to spend an odd hour now and 
then in a railway station, there is nothing mbre 
entertaining than to look over the books in the 
ample stalls at the station-house of every consider- 
able town. And there is more of interest and 
point to this, from the fact that one house in Lon- 
don (W. H. Smith & Son) supplies all the rail- 
ways in the kingdom, with the exception of a 
single line. One gets, therefore, a pretty good 
idea of the books that are read by the traveling 
community ; and this, after all, represents the 
more intelligent class. Thus we may approximate 
to a tolerably correct judgment of what is the 
living modern literature of England. Of course 
we do not expect to see the books of the highest 
scientific character at the railway stands, though 
even this is not impossible ; but we find there the 
books that are read, that seize the popular rnind 
and heart. One finds in these stalls books that 
glow with the fresh life of genius, whether they 
be new or old. Translations of the Iliad I have 
frequently seen. Robinson Crusoe everywhere 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 131 

displays his peaked cap. Macaulay's Lays and Es- 
says are more common than his Histories. Kings- 
ley's vigorous productions abound. Tennyson's 
poems are rarely wanting. Such books as Hugh 
Miller's " Testimony of the Rocks," and Lie big's 
Chemistry, and works upon scientific agriculture, 
are generally to be found. 

It is surprising how many female authors supply 
this every-day literary food to the traveler. The 
works of Charlotte Bronte, Mrs. Browning, Mrs. 
Stowe, Mrs. Gaskell, Miss Yonge, Miss Mulock, 
and above all the authoress of " Adam Bede," 
occupy the prominent places on the crowded 
shelves — a delicate index this of the high and 
true character of English civilization. In few 
other countries are women suffered to instruct or 
give the moral tone to society. The writings of a 
George Sand, or a Bettina von Arnim, are read, 
it is true, in France and Germany, for their ex- 
citing and novel spicery, but they give no perma- 
nent nourishment to the thought or life of the 
nation. It is gratifying, also, to see how many 
American books pass daily through the hands and 
minds of the English public. When I was in 
England, besides Mrs. Stowe's writings, which 
appear at all book- stalls and shops, Hawthorne's 
stories, Irving's and Cooper's works, Arthur 
Coxe's poems, H. W. Beecher's " Life-Thoughts," 
Dr. Holmes's works, Prime's book on the East, 
Motley's and Prescott's histories, but, above and 
beyond all, Longfellow's poems, were the famil- 



132 OLD ENGLAND. 

iar hand-books of every reading person. An Eng 
lish gentleman told me that Longfellow was even 
more generally read in England than Tennyson. 
I could almost believe him, for I have frequently 
met cultured persons who could quote Longfellow 
freely. He is really, as De Quincey says, "pub- 
lished " in England. He has struck that happy 
middle chord of sentiment and fancy that vibrates 
in the English heart averse to high excitement and 
pure idealism. Wordsworth was metaphysical, and 
gathered the select circle about him. Tennyson 
is, perhaps, too subjective for the present money- 
making age. He is not yet altogether understood. 
Longfellow plays upon the familiar, pathetic harp, 
that hangs by the fireside, that breathes of com- 
mon duties, home affections, pure thoughts, and 
ennobling fancies ; that just touches the imagina- 
tion and fires it, without tasking thought. 

" Who ne'er his bread in sorrow ate, 

Who ne'er the mournful midnight hours 
Weeping upon his bed has sate, 
He knows you not, ye heavenly powers ! " 

Even to such a translated verse Longfellow has 
given his inimitable grace and music, and one likes 
to be crooning and singing it over to himself. It 
eases the heart of annoyances and pain, and does 
one good. 

Worcester comes next in our course of travel 
north. Its imposing cathedral is nearly of the same 
magnitude, and has much the same character, as 
Gloucester Cathedral. Like that edifice, its crypt 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 133 

and nave were Norman, and it has no western tur- 
rets, but its central tower, with rich open parapet 
and octangular turrets, is the very flower and per- 
fection of the later style. The choir is Early Eng- 
lish, with highly carved canopied stalls, and won- 
derfully bold flower-work. Those old artists seemed 
to have brought basketfuls of all the flowers of the 
field into the church, and flung them over the 
walls. 

As the Early English may be called the second 
style of architecture to be found in England, we 
will say a word about it. This style gradually suc- 
ceeded the Norman, and prevailed from the begin- 
ning of the reign of Richard I. in 1189, to the end 
of the reign of Henry III. in 1272, a period of about 
one hundred years. We may date the time of tran- 
sition from the chivalrous epoch of the first cru- 
sade, when the troubadour and ballad poetry arose, 
and new-born ideas of freedom and beauty seemed 
to be struggling with the old force and tyranny. 
The simple characteristic of this style is the pointed 
arch, long and narrow at first like the head of a 
knight's lance, and then expanding into the great 
windows, such as those at York Minster, which, 
filled with painted glass, have such a glorious effect. 
Still the round lines of the Norman architecture 
were retained in many particulars, in the trefoil 
and quatre-foil heading of doors and windows, and 
in the large circular windows, like those at Lincoln 
and Peterborough. We can even see how the 
pointed arch grew from the accidental intersections 



134 OLD ENGLAND. 

of round arches with each other, making pointed 
arches of the intermediate spaces. The pointed 
arch lifted the building from its heaviness and 
earthiness. It heightened the ceiling, and as a nat- 
ural development, it sprung toward heaven as far 
as it could carry upward its lines in the slenderly 
pointed spire. We find perhaps the most perfect 
instance of the Early English style, from end to 
end, from foundation stone to the summit of the 
exquisite spire, in the Salisbury Cathedral. To 
support this greater height, this mighty upspringing 
mass, wide and prominent buttresses were added, 
which in the compact Norman architecture were 
usually but small round projections from the wall 
itself. These flying buttresses with their double 
stories of arches and their pinnacled tops, form a 
new and bold feature. In the original contract for 
the building of Fotheringay Church, it is written : 
" And aither of the said Isles shal have six mighty 
Botrasse of Fre stone, clen hewyn ; and every Bot- 
rasse fynisht with a fynial." A very characteristic 
ornament of the Early English style is the " tooth - 
ornament," taking the place of the Norman zigzag 
moulding around the arches of the windows and 
doors. It is as much like a necklace of shark's 
teeth that the Pacific Islanders wear, as any thing. 
But all kinds of rich and delicate decoration begin 
to appear in the later period of this style. Profuse 
flower-work is seen in the garlanded heads of pil- 
lars, and the budding tips of corbels. Every thing 
ended in a flower. There was far more of grace 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 135 

and delicacy, and yet hardly less of strength, than 
in the Norman style. The vaultings of the roof at 
their lines of intersection were ribbed ; and cross- 
springing and transverse ribs were introduced, thus 
weaving a rich tracery over the plain Anglo-Nor- 
man ceiling, though it was just as massive stone- 
work as before. And while the columns and piers 
were as mighty and ponderous, yet the rounds and 
hollows into which thev were cut save them a more 
elaborate and elegant character. So that the 
Early English style has been judged by some to be 
the perfection of English architecture, because it 
retained the strength and simplicity of the Norman 
united with most of what was truly ornate and 
beautiful in the later styles. But these old churches 
were so long in building that we find examples of 
all the ages of architecture in their various portions, 
and a practiced eye will take them apart and read 
their history at a glance. From a little moulding, 
or hidden newel, the age of the hand that reared 
the tall tower might be known. For an educated 
American youth to have no knowledge at all of 
architecture, this would deprive him of a species of 
sharpened culture that is not dreamy or vague, but 
is as scientific and harmonious as the laws of music. 
It requires study, and taxes the analytic powers. 
Such a youth would not be fitted to visit Westmin- 
ster Abbey, and to tread the solemn and storied 
temples of Old England. Let him defer his voyage 
a year, until he knows the difference between a 
tower and a spire, a groin and a gable. Besides, 



136 OLD ENGLAND. 

there is nothing finer in the architecture of the 
world than the English Cathedrals. 

In Worcester Cathedral is the tomb of King 
John. Some sixty years ago the tomb was opened, 
and the dress was found to be precisely similar to 
that represented upon the monument. His statue, 
which was probably a portrait, looks better than his 
portrait as it stands in history. The point of his 
sword is held in the mouth of a crocodile with a 
•lion's body, denoting strength and cunning. The 
strong old Bishop of Worcester, St. Wulstan, who, 
tradition says, struck his silver crosier into the rock 
so that no one but himself could draw it out, is also 
buried here. Here too is the monument of Stilling- 
fleet, who was Bishop of Worcester, appointed by 
William III. It is interesting to happen upon the 
discovery of the spot where a great man lived and 
died, for one easily forgets these local particulars in 
recalling the work that he did and the ideas he 
originated. Stillingfleet did no small work for the 
cause of rational Christianity and a true Christian 
philosophy. 

From Worcester I took the regular coach to 
Great Malvern, which stands upon the slope of the 
hills that rise gracefully from the plains to the 
height of 1300 feet, and extend in a long ridge run- 
ning from north to south. The crest of the green 
hill just above the town is grand from its height and 
steepness. Until late in the evening I saw the 
moving of small white figures upon the dark back- 
ground of the sky ; they were indefatigable English 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY.] 137 

ladies, who will walk and climb as long as they can 
see. These hills are a favorite roaming ground for 
all who visit Malvern, lifted up into the pure cool 
atmosphere, yielding magnificent prospects, and 
sprinkled with brilliant and hardy flowers. I spent 
the next day in driving about the hills to Little 
Malvern, West Malvern, and Malvern Wells. The 
way lay through a laurel-fringed road opening con- 
tinually upon a wide panorama below, * stretching 
away over the vale of the Severn and the flat green 
plain of Worcester and Warwick, like an immense 
prairie. Macaulay sings, 

Till twelve fair counties saw the blaze 
On Malvern's lonely height." 

We passed Camp Hill, cut into military terraces by 
the old Romans for one of their strong mountain 
citadels, when they held a half-conquered country 
by main force. I may be wrong in saying this, for 
it may be remembered that when the northern 
tribes began to threaten and harass the British, the 
last sent a petition to Rome called " the groans of 
the Britons," showing a thoroughly crushed and 
discouraged people, and one that had become en- 
tirely dependent upon their conquerors for protec- 
tion. I saw on both sides of the Malvern Hills the 
entrance to the Tunnel which runs through them 
for a mile and a half, and which is not yet com- 
pleted. It promises to be as arduous an undertak- 
ing as the " Hoosac Tunnel," but English pluck 
and capital will carry it through, as Yankee energy 
will doubtless do what it undertakes. The sheep 



138 OLD ENGLAND. 

were nestling beneath the banks in little hollows in 
the dirt, to protect themselves from the heat. They 
run almost wild over the hills, and in winter sustain 
themselves upon the clumps of " gorse " which they 
dig out from the snow. They do not wander far 
from the spot where they are first turned out and 
fed. Brown thrushes and yellow humbers were 
plentiful. 

In the distance, upon the Hereford side of the 
Malvern Hills, rose the monument or pillar of the 
Somers family. This is one of those proud memo- 
rials, the one responding to the other over hill and 
vale, which remind us of the well-known fact that 
England is divided up chiefly among twenty or 
thirty great families. The Marquis of Bute, who 
not many years since attained his majority, has im- 
mense estates in nine counties of Great Britain. 
These rich and powerful families give the law to 
every thing. All is cut to this large pattern, and 
the tendency is and will be, until a great change 
comes, for landed property to be more and more 
consolidated in the hands of a few. The land ap- 
pears to one like a great temple, around which the 
" Dii majores " and the " Dii minores " sit, and 
shed down upon the common people influences in 
some respects perhaps benign, but certainly not al- 
together so. Among some useful virtues of order 
and reverence that may be engendered by this sys- 
tem, it would be extraordinary if the vices of mer- 
cenariness and servility were not also bred by it. 
" Your Honor this," and " Your Honor that," sig- 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 139 

nify " act the lord now by your humble servant," — 
" do the generous thing." None are more willing 
to confess this than intelligent Englishmen them- 
selves. The class of people who are the immediate 
dependants of the great are the most injuriously 
affected. They catch a faint reflection of the 
higher polish with which they come in daily con- 
tact, and this serves to separate them from people 
of their own station, which in turn drives them 
back into a closer and more slavishly humiliating 
dependence upon the higher class. It would re- 
quire singular virtue for such a class to retain any 
nobility of character. The insular position and con- 
fined spaces of the kingdom tend to fix and stratify 
these distinctions of society, and do not permit 
classes to come nearer together. The old Danish 
distinction of the people into " eorls " (earls) and 
" ceorls " (churls) exists still in English society. 
The fact however, that some have derided, of so 
many of the English peerages having had a com- 
mercial origin, as the modern Earls of Northumber- 
land and Warwick, and the older houses of Dart- 
mouth, Pomfret, Leeds, Ducie, and Ward, is on 
the whole a fact that speaks better for the aris- 
tocracy than many others that might be named. 
Even the rigid old law of primogeniture is not so 
rigid as I for one had supposed, Justice Sir John 
Barnard Byles, now of the Court of Common Pleas, 
stated to a friend of mine in conversation that the 
entail of all the entailed estates in England could 
be cut off, when the eldest son coming of age con- 



140 OLD ENGLAND. 

sented, excepting in four cases. These four were 
estates conferred and made hereditary by act of 
Parliament, and the entail could be cut off only by 
Parliament. They were the estates of the Duke 
of Wellington, Duke of Marlborough, Earl of 
Shrewsbury, and Earl of Arundel. It is quite pos- 
sible that one or more of these may have derived 
their estates from some other source, the main point 
being that the entailment is permanent. The Jus- 
tice furthermore stated that no property could be 
entailed for any period longer than a life or lives in 
being and twenty-one years. He illustrated this by 
the case of the Duke of Buckingham, who got so 
heavily in debt that his personal property could not 
pay his debts. His eldest son, heir to the title and 
estates, the Marquis of Chandos, being of age, 
joined with his father and cut off the entail, thus 
giving up the property to satisfy the creditors. He 
said the Duke was at that time living in lodgings 
in London, too poor to keep a servant. The Duch- 
ess was living at Hampton Court in apartments 
granted by the Queen without charge. The Mar- 
quis of Chandos was held in great respect, and on 
the death of his father would doubtless become a 
peer of the realm. 

England is a country which moves onward, 
though in its own way ; and the majority of Eng- 
lishmen believe with Lord Bacon that political 
changes, like those of Nature, should be gradual. 
Sooner or later, however, they must come. 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 141 

" When Reason's voice, 
Loud as the voice of Nature, shall have waked 
The nations ; and mankind perceive that vice 
Is discord, war, and misery ; — that virtue 
Is peace, and happiness, and harmony ; 
When man's maturer nature shall disdain 
The playthings of his childhood." 

But we cannot judge England by America. 
There is a painful and ponderous sense of form in 
the English mind that we cannot comprehend. 
There is often real freedom where there seems to 
be but servile routine. A newly created constitu- 
tion built upon abstract principles and cut off from 
the Past, however perfect, would not work well for 
England, or at least all at once. A " Code Napo- 
leon " would be out of place. Something like it, I 
believe, is being now attempted in England in the 
reform and codification of statute law ; but the vast 
confusion and overturn it would necessarily intro- 
duce, were it carried out suddenly and thoroughly, 
will , probably prevent a transformation of the pres- 
ent English Constitution into any thing like a 
purely philosophical system. 

Would that in America we could see our real 
advantage over England, and not those factitious 
advantages concerning which we are sometimes in- 
clined to glorify ourselves. The principle of self- 
government is a higher principle than that of loyalty 
to the best sovereign, genuine as that principle may 
be ; for it is fidelity to the highest good of all, and 
to virtue, intelligence, and God. He who shares 
in the government gains in moral dignity. His 



142 OLD ENGLAND. 

manhood is developed by responsibility. He loves 
and will maintain a government in which his own 
will and intelligent choice are involved. He will 
feel that upon his single arm, his single voice, his 
single life, hangs the preservation of the govern- 
ment and the national freedom. This is the Amer- 
ican feeling. It burns in every true American 
breast. It gives us an incalculable advantage over 
aristocratic nations such as England, but it is a 
perilous superiority. We have cut away from a 
vast deal that is useless, and worse than useless, 
and we have a free field before us, if we can but 
stand fast in this liberty, and not be again entan- 
gled in the bondage of Old World political ideas, 
and of our own low passions for power and wealth. 
Man is free in America to develop himself if he 
can govern himself. This is the difficult but glori- 
ous problem before us to work out. Let us be 
humbler and more watchful, for we carry the 
world's higher destiny with us over the trembling 
road that leads to the universal freedom of the race. 
That with all our faults and imperfections we have 
in the main succeeded thus far in the maintenance 
of the principle of popular sovereignty, the people 
of the Old World cannot deny. Many have been 
magnanimous enough to confess it, as have such no- 
ble minds as Jeffrey, and Macaulay, and such true 
men as Goldwin Smith, Richard Cobden, John 
Bright, and Thomas Hughes. What great praise 
was that which was freely accorded to our country, 
by an English newspaper, in connection with the 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 143 

Prince of "Wales' visit : " He has seen a nation of 
soldiers without an army ; civil order without a 
police ; wealth, luxury, and culture without a court 
or an aristocracy. He has learned to mingle with 
the busy crowd of men without the intervention of 
chamberlains and courtiers ; he has found respect 
without ceremony, and honor without adulation." 
England is the only truly free country of the 
Old World, and the Englishman is a free man ; 
but our glory is, that humanity itself, one and indi- 
visible, may rise to a higher plane with us than in 
England. In England the son treads precisely in 
the footsteps of his fathers, and it is hard for a man 
(though there have been a few marked exceptions 
to this) to rise above the dead level of the class of 
society — it may be the lowest — in which he was 
born. There is an oppressive weight resting on 
the spirit of the lower classes, and a volcanic heav- 
ing beneath this mass of ancient tyrannic opinion. 
If the English government had spent as much for 
the education of the people, as it has to sustain the 
Poor Laws, there would have been a different state 
of things now in England ; but so long as the abso- 
lute caste-system prevails to such an unnatural and 
irrational extent, the government will feel no sincere 
desire to educate the people above their present 
condition. Here then is our undeniable ground of 
superiority. And yet we seem to be ever on the 
point of casting away this inestimable practical ad- 
vantage, and of allowing the really vulgar idea of 
material luxury to overcome and overwhelm the 



144 OLD ENGLAND. 

higher and nobler good. But let us leave such 
high themes on. this gentle summer's day! The 
wild thyme of the hills smells too sweet for contro- 
versy. 

We come now to a different region from the 
green and fragrant Malvern Hills. Dudley, where 
I happened to be detained for some two or three 
hours, is one of the reeking mouths of the great 
Stafford coal-pit. I walked up the long, dirty, 
paved hill, to see the ruins of Dudley Castle. Ruins 
they were indeed, not smoothed over, and cherished 
and sentimentalized upon, but left pretty much to 
time, decay, and filthiness. Yet there was some- 
thing rather grand in the grim old keep, that looked 
down in majestic scorn on a hundred modern man- 
ufactories. Lady Jane Grey, whose death the 
world mourned, probably lived here for a while. 
The castle belonged to an ambitious, bad, and plot- 
ting race, of which Robert Dudley, Earl of Leices- 
ter, was one ; and which in the person of John 
Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, grew all-power- 
ful. Protector, but as history more than hints, 
murderer, of Edward VL, and the tempter of Lady 
Jane Grey, he undoubtedly aspired to absolute 
power. Now his very home, and seat of power, 
which he also obtained by treachery, is one of the 
least cared-for wrecks in the land. Its stones are 
defiled, its trees are cut down, its broad lands are 
turned into scorched coal-fields and places for flam- 
ing blast-furnaces. It is singular to look down 
from the walls of this feudal castle, over a region 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 145 

like the plain of Shinar, as far as the eye can reach, 
glimmering with fires, and its smoke ascending 
continually to heaven. The town of Dudley itself 
is hardly less smutchy and comfortless than the 
castle. A savage-featured, reckless set of dirty 
men and women hung about the little station-house, 
which was in the neighborhood of a large mine 
three hundred yards deep. A brutal " mill " be- 
tween an obese gray-haired man and a powerful 
middle-aged man, came off upon the platform of 
•the station-house. I helped to raise the old man 
who fell on his back like a bag of sand, and appar- 
ently as lifeless. The affair seemed to be a matter 
of course, and I need not have interfered. These 
men have a lawless code of laws among themselves, 
and fighting is a daily business, — a way of settling 
pretty much every thing. The word is followed 
by the blow. Life is not valued too highly. If a 
man is killed by a fall of coal, or by being crushed 
in the shafts, there is a kind of " wake," which is 
rather a merry-making than a funeral. The col- 
liers make a great deal of money, and spend it as 
quickly in carousing. The proportion of crime in, 
the mining counties is lamentably the greatest. 
Some faint attempts at reformatory and missionary 
operations in this vicinity have been thus far of 
little avail. It requires the courage and self-devo- 
tion of a Wesley, to go among this people. They 
differ entirely from the Cornish miners, and a part 
of this is owing to the noble efforts of Wesley him- 
self amid the rocks and pits of Land's End. In- 
10 



146 OLD ENGLAND. 

stead of quarreling about white surplices and purple 
chasubles, what a noble field of Christian warfare 
is here ! Some George Miiller, or Miss Marsh, or 
Florence Nightingale, will doubtless come down 
like an angel and stir this black pool. But here 
lies the material strength of England. " Deep in 
unfathomable mines " God has here garnered up 
her physical resources. If there be a correspond- 
ing depth of trust in His work and Word in spirit- 
ual things, England may yet stand some cycles 
more against the world. England has not had the 
fatal gifts of gold and silver, but she has had the 
better gifts whereby she may get gold and silver, 
and all that they stand for, and at the same time 
draw out her own skill and force. 

After other geologic ages which had their impor- 
tant place in the foundations of the world, and of 
this favored corner-stone of it, there was an untold 
period when England, rising above the waters in a 
number of scattered islands, was one great forest of 
fern and coniferous trees. They grew upon the 
earth of the carboniferous limestone. The imagi- 
nation of Hugh Miller could only begin to faintly 
conceive of the stupendous richness of this vegeta- 
tion. It has been reckoned that a 122,400 years 
were necessary for the accumulation of sixty feet 
of coal." God only knows what ages it must have 
required to hide away in so quiet a bed that the 
most delicately rayed palm leaf is not broken, such 
abysmal layers of coal deposite. The beds of coal 
in South Wales are reckoned to be 12,000 feet in 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 147 

thickness. We are reminded of a characteristic 
answer of one of the vigorous-witted Beecher fam- 
ily, when asked if there were enough coal in the 
prairie country of the West to supply the wants of 
those woodless regions : " Enough to warm the 
world while it lasted, and to burn it up when it 
was done." It is true that nice calculations are 
made as to the probable giving out of the coal 
wealth of England ; but practical miners, I am 
told, do not generally agree with the theories that 
assign such very brief limits of two hundred, or 
even one hundred years, to the coal resources of 
England. There are such great and unexpected 
variations in the arefi and thickness of seams, that 
there is no absolute judging of the amount or the 
direction of the coal deposite in a given locality. 
The coal limits are, it is true, externally mapped 
and accurately defined, but internally they are not 
and cannot be. It is answered that though there 
may be coal enough stored away in the bosom of 
the earth, yet on account of increased heat, venti- 
lation and expense of machinery, it is impracticable 
to work it at such immense depths. But there are 
now shafts twenty-one hundred feet deep, or nearly 
half a mile, up which the coal is easily raised. 
This is done by means of engines of enormous 
power with wheels of thirty feet in diameter, that 
bring up the coal from that depth in a minute of 
time, each revolution raising it ninety feet. At 
the Merton Colliery near Durham, there was, 
during the sinking of the mine, I am told, a sud- 



148 OLD ENGLAND. 

den obstruction to the works from a great flow of 
water. Shaft after shaft was sunk, until nine 
powerful engines were in operation, pumping 
up the incredible amount of fourteen millions of 
gallons of water, or seventy-two thousand tons, 
in twenty-four hours, from a depth of 450 feet ! 
In this way a subterranean lake of water and 
quicksand was drained. Here surely was energy. 
We argue that so long as coal is to be found, it 
can be got at by that Anglo-Saxon hardihood and 
ingenuity which already mines for it under the sea, 
and under other geological strata. And if the coal 
should fail, this is not, I believe, the end of Eng- 
land. This race will find out and utilize some 
other force of Nature. There are coal substitutes 
now discovered, which need but the development 
and application of science to make them available 
in a hundred practical ways. If a spark of elec- 
tricity sends a message from shore to shore of the 
Atlantic, what limitless power resides in this agent 
alone ! While I rejoice that God has given us un- 
limited coal resources, I am not disposed to exult 
with some in the fact that the period of England's 
greatness is drawing to a culmination, simply be- 
cause of the probable or supposed failure of her coal 
crop. She may have to husband and economize her 
coal somewhat more carefully in future, but coal is 
no more king than cotton. This is quite the tend- 
ency of much of the reasoning at the present time, 
which gives no place to higher spiritual forces. 
I do not believe that a nation's greatness resides 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 149 

in her material resources, but in her will, faith, 
intelligence, and moral forces. Civilization rests 
upon deeper principles than the earth's soil or pro- 
ductions. The same race, on the rocks of New 
England, w T here granite and ice are the chief 
crops, became powerful without coal. Mr. Glad- 
stone himself may get frightened (or may feign to 
be) by the prospect of the coal giving out, and 
declare that the debt of England will never be 
paid if such an event should occur, but he would 
be the last man to confess that the English nation 
would give out with her coal. Why should we 
wish England's power to decline ? Is it from a 
jealous sense of rivalry ? That is a sentiment un- 
worthy a great nation. Is it because England is 
our enemy and is working us injury? England 
has done us wrong, deep wrong, but there are in- 
finitely more points of affiliation at this moment 
between America and England, than between 
America and France, or America and Russia. 
America is working more change upon England 
than England upon America. The same blood, 
faith, ideas, and literature, constitute a unity in 
nature and spirit, that no external or accidental 
relations can ever create between us and other 
foreign nations : — 

Tb £vYy€v4s roi Seivbv % 0' djxiXia. 

I profess no special love of England, and have 
felt as deeply as any one the sense of her blind 
and selfish injustice toward our country in the 



150 OLD ENGLAND. 

late war, but I have never lost sight of the prin- 
ciple that the two nations were essentially one, 
that they should acknowledge this unity, that they 
will do so in the final struggle between free and 
despotic principles, and that for the sake of hu- 
manity they should learn to know and love each 
other better than they do. Lord Derby has truly 
said, that " no other earthly event would conduce 
so much to the future of civilization as the union 
of these two countries." I believe this. And I 
believe also that both countries have in them 
greater sources of peril to their prosperity than the 
possible failure of their coal or cotton crops. Eng- 
land will perish if she rests on her material re- 
sources for her greatness, and so will America. 
But to return to the Staffordshire coal region. 
Birmingham, the home of Watt, is a busy child 
of the Severn coal basin, and is almost within sight 
from the walls of Dudley Castle. She stretches 
her black hands to Manchester, who shouts over to 
Leeds, who sends on to grimy Newcastle the cry 
of " Coal ! Commerce ! and Chartered Rights ! " 

The chief amount of coal deposite thus far found 
in England is, if I mistake not, in the Newcastle 
and Durham coal-fields, from the Am to the Tees. 
There is also an immense coal basin in Yorkshire, 
in the West Riding, south of Leeds and Bradford, 
extending to Nottingham. There is an equally 
important coal region in Glamorganshire, in South 
Wales. In Cumberland and Lancaster Counties 
are likewise vast fields. And in many of the 



WORCESTER TO DUDLEY. 1.51 

midland counties coal is found in great and ap- 
parently exhaustless quantities. But while enu- 
merating the coal riches of England, the poor col- 
lier himself, driving his dismal work down under 
the ruins of a former world, exposed to per- 
petual peril from mephitic vapors and crumbling 
walls, dangling upon a slender rope, or crawling 
up shafts like interminable chimneys, upon ladders 
that will rot, should not be forgotten. There is 
stout manhood under his dirt-crusted brutality. 
He says he " wins " the coal. He does indeed win 
it. He never descends into the coal-pit but with 
the chances immensely augmented that he will 
never see another sun. It is computed that fifteen 
hundred lives are annually lost in England by acci- 
dents in coal mines. The most dreadful of these 
enemies is the " fire-damp," whose chief ingredient 
is carburetted hydrogen, which, with a certain 
mixture of common air, becomes explosive. In 
mines where the ventilation is imperfect, a single 
act of carelessness will fill miles upon miles of sub- 
terranean chambers with a streaming blaze of fire, 
sometimes rising to the surface and bursting out of 
the shafts with the roar and violence of a volcano. 
And the poor miners, it is said, will carry their 
pipes, though forbidden, into the long and distant 
reaches of the mine — whence this continual danger. 
When we sit down before a genial winter fire, let 
us think of those bold hearts who have " won " 
the coal for us. 



CHAPTER IX. 

LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 

A more tranquil, sleepy, and yet high-feeling 
old ecclesiastical town than Lichfield, in the green 
and pleasant valley of South Offlow Hundred, can 
hardly be found. It is proud of its Cathedral, of 
its siege, of its Tory renown, of its memories of 
Dr. Johnson, of its relationship to the illustrious 
families of Anson and Anglesey. Lichfield is a 
genuine example of an unchanged English town 
of some six or seven thousand inhabitants, with its 
walled " Close," its " Minster Pool," its " Butcher 
Row," its " Three Crowns Inn," its " King Ed- 
ward's Grammar-School," all as in the former 
days. 

The Hotel bore evidences of considerable past 
splendor. The mahogany furniture, black and 
polished, was majestically carved and stately. The 
principal staircase had white marble steps, though 
they were worn into hollows in the middle. And 
there was a long ball-room up-stairs, with old- 
fashioned mirrors and a gorgeous chandelier. The 
names of the streets, St. John Street, Bird Street, 
Frog Street, Gore Street, Wade Street, etc., are 
unmodernized. One road out of the town leads to 
Tamworth, and to Ashby-de-la-Zouch some eight 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 153 

miles distant, the scene of Ivanhoe's achievement. 
Drayton Manor, the seat of Sir Robert Peel, " the 
member from Tamworth," is seven miles from 
Lichfield. Tamworth Castle, now belonging to 
the Townshend family, is a very old Norman 
structure built by Robert Marmion. 

" They hailed him Lord Marmiou; 
They hailed him Lord of Fontenaye, 
Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbaye, 
Of Tamworth tower and town." 

Five miles from Lichfield is venerable Wichnor 
Park, which was formerly held by the tenure of 
its possessor being obliged to furnish an annual 
flitch of bacon to every married pair " w T ho, after 
being married a year and a day, should make oath 
that they had never quarreled ! " This custom has 
been revived, and there have not been wanting 
honest candidates for this amiable prize. Thus 
every thing in and about Lichfield leads to the 
past, and makes a pleasing and restful contrast 
from the surrounding workshop and coal-bin of 
Staffordshire. 

In front of the Bishop's Palace, on the north 
side of the Cathedral, is a shaded avenue called 
" The Dean's Walk," and is said to have been a 
favorite resort of Major Andre. This looks down 
upon the lovely pastoral vale of Stow, and the 
traditionary spot where the early martyrs were 
slain, called " The Field of Dead Bodies," which 
gave the name to Lichfield, or Litchfield, as it is 
sometimes written, and which signifies field of the 



154 OLD ENGLAND. 

dead. The arms of Lichfield is a shield covered 
with the representation of piteously hacked limbs, 
mixed with axes and knives. 

" Lichfield should be a field of good, 
For it was watered with holy blude." 

In the rural valley of Stow Mr. Day lived, the 
author of " Sandford and Merton." With ten 
thousand others who have been boys once, I 
should like to assist in erecting a monument to 
him and Defoe conjointly, in some secluded and 
beautiful spot in the middle of green England, to 
be given and consecrated to the " Joy of Boys." 
Forever blessed be the memory of men who have 
done something to make yOuth " frisch, frei, 
frolich, fromm.'" 

On the little path that leads down into Stow 
Valley, stands an off-shoot of Dr. Johnson's willow- 
tree. The original one in which he took a great 
interest was blown down about forty years ago. 
Passing along u Butcher's Row " toward the mar- 
ket-place where is Dr. Johnson's statue, is the spot 
where Lord Brooke was killed by a shot fired by a 
deaf and dumb man from the battlements of the 
Cathedral. The monument of the Doctor fronts 
the house where he was born and lived. I found 
two big-limbed young countrymen intently gazing 
at it, and after a long pause one of them asked the 
other, " Who war the mon ? " The other an- 
swered, " I 'se forgot, but he war some gret mon." 

It is a clumsy affair, but perhaps good enough 
to answer every purpose. There is a colossal sit- 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 155 

ting figure, with plenty of books around, if indeed 
the " gret mon " is not sitting on a pile of them. 
The relievos of the pedestal represent the good, 
brave Englishman in his youth, one of them as a 
boy chaired by his schoolfellows ; another of him 
listening to Dr. Sachervell's preaching, mounted 
on his father's shoulders ; and another of him 
standing bareheaded in the rain at Uttoxeter, to do 
penance for youthful disrespect to his father. 

The house where he lived in his youth, on the 
west side of the market-place, is a neat, three-sto- 
ried, excellent brick dwelling. Instead of M. 
Johnson, which was formerly written upon it, it 
has now a sign in large letters, " Clarke — draper." 
The next door to it is the u Three Crowns Inn " 
where Dr. Johnson and Boswell put up, and where 
the autocrat of the bar-room told Boswell, who was 
disparaging the respectable quietness of Lichfield, 
" Sir, we are a city of philosophers, we work with 
our heads, and make the boobies of Birmingham 
work for us with their hands." 

The Grammar-School where Johnson, and Ad^ 
dison (who was the son of the Dean of Lichfield), 
and Garrick went to school, had fallen into decay, 
but has been recently repaired, and indeed rebuilt, 
preserving its ancient Elizabethan character. The 
little shops that one sees going down quiet St. John 
Street to visit it, reminded me of Hawthorne's de- 
scription of the " Cent store " in the " Scarlet Let- 
ter," and of such little magazines of respectable and 
uncomplaining poverty as even now may be seen 
in some of our oldest New England towns. 



156 OLD ENGLAND. 

My first visit to the Cathedral was immediately 
on arriving in the evening. I walked by the long, 
tranquil " Pool " in the heart of the town, which 
reflects each object and building around in its 
smooth mirror, giving a reposeful look to the whole 
place. I turned down the neatly paved and al- 
most solitary lane, that led to the Cathedral inclos- 
ure, and was delighted with its west front, simple 
in form, yet enriched with elaborate lines and 
ornament, and carrying the eye upward in its soar- 
ing towers and spires. 

The good verger's wife let me go in and walk 
around as an especial favor, at this late hour. Ev- 
ery one who has a taste for such things should see 
one of these old cathedrals at this moment, just 
when evening is fading into night. The yellow 
moon shone in the lofty painted windows on one side, 
and the last crimson light of day struck the upper 
windows on the opposite side. Parts of the vast ed- 
ifice were already lost in darkness, and while some 
of the round pillars and foliated capitals stood out full 
in light, others were hardly seen, as in the depths 
of a forest, and masses of black shadow like giant 
hands crossed the pavement. The silent figures 
of martyrs, saints, and heroes stretched on their 
tombs, lay around. The activities of this life were 
over with them forever. It was a place where the 
ages had come, and bowed down and confessed 
their sins and need of God. Here rich and poor 
had knelt together. What were our shadowy 
earthly life and its restless ambitions, compared 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 157 

with these holy and eternal associations of " God's 
house." In such places, the old Catholic hymn 
seems to have a truth in it : 

" O ! tua palatia 
Quanto decet sanctitas ! 
O ! tua sacraria 
Quanto decet pietas, 
Deus formidabilis ! 

" Quis profanis pedibus 
Audeat accedere ? 
Quis pollutis vocibus 
Hymnos tibi canere ? 
Hospes, terribilis! " 

The danger is, that the worshiper will be satisfied 
with the lower beauty, and the temple will stand 
in place of Him to whom it is consecrated. The 
desire also to restore the perfect church, even to its 
smallest seat and wash-basin, naturally draws along 
with it the wish and intention to reinstate in its old 
place the ancient ceremonial, the entire Catholic 
service ; and it were perhaps well on this account 
not to continue to call these " Cathedral " churches, 
or not to give them any distinction above other 
houses of worship, for they are after all but stone 
and mortar. They had better be burned down by 
a madman, as York Minster came so near being, or 
left to tumble into the sea, as Kilnsea Church did, 
rather than draw men's thoughts from the true 
building and worship of God. 

I spoke of the west front of the Cathedral. It 
is a pyramidal gable, supported on the sides by two 
towers and hexagonal-banded spires, with a large 



158 OLD ENGLAND. 

decorated window in the centre, and the whole 
face lined with rich canopied arcades. The door is 
deeply recessed, and almost as sumptuously and 
curiously wrought as the entrance of a Moorish 
mosque in Spain. Figures of the evangelists stand 
around the cavernous portal, in niches under frost- 
work tabernacles. Luxuriant iron scrolls run like 
vine branches over the doors. The middle spire, 
258 feet high, built in the place of one which fell 
in the siege, is six-sided, and incomparable for 
lightness and elegance. These three magnificent 
spires rise from the bosom of the town like three 
tall tapering pine-trees, that shoot up to heaven far 
above the rest of the low forest by which they are 
surrounded, and bear the thoughts up with them 
into a higher and purer region. The church is 
terminated by a rich hectagonal Lady Chapel, 
whose interior, with its central shaft, is still more 
delicate and elaborate. The heightened ornament- 
ation, the free and flowing carved foliage, the --di- 
verging net-work of the groined roof, the trefoiled* 
arches, the clustered pillars, the exquisitely finished 
Lady Chapel, belong chiefly to the epoch of the 
Decorated style ; and happening thus naturally in 
the order of our journeying, I would give a glance 
at this third description of English architecture, 
which followed the Early English, and prevailed 
about 100 years from the reign of Edward I. in 
1272, to the end of the reign of Edward III. in 
1377. It may be called the style of the first three 
Edwards. 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 159 

The name of this style, " Decorated," suffi- 
ciently describes it. It is the former style or styles 
covered with a freer, bolder, and more flowing or- 
nament, all parts being modified by this graceful 
idea. As yet it begins to show but few signs of 
decay or weakness. Ornament is not generally 
the end, but the means of a richer and heightened 
effect. Two characters of lines are seen in the 
forms of its windows, doors, arches, mouldings, 
etc. ; these are the geometric and the flowing lines, 
The first might be cut with the playful turning of 
a pair of compasses into semicircles, circles, ellipses, 
trefoils, quatrefoils, cinquefoils, etc. ; the last are 
composed of wavy and flowing lines, and especially 
of what is called the u ogee," a combination formed 
by the meeting of a round and a hollow, a concave 
and a convex. The " ogee-arch " is one whose 
two sides are composed of two contrasted curves. 
There is a greater drawing out and more striking 
pronunciation of all lines, the hollows being deeper, 
the rounds longer. There are very irregular com- 
binations, bold clusterings of things great and 
small, round and sharp. The flower-work is no 
longer a stiff thorn-bush foliage, but vine-like, run- 
ning and flame-pointed, wreathing over and smoth- 
ering every capital, and flowing along every 
groined arch, in tropical profusion. The bare, 
plain shaft of the Norman, or Early English, 
seems, like Aaron's rod, to have budded. In the 
earlier times of this style, an ornament called " dia- 
per work " frequently occurs. One may see fine 



160 OLD ENGLAND. 

specimens of it in the side-screen of Lincoln Cathe- 
dral, and upon the monument of William de Va- 
lence, in Westminster Abbey. It is a four-leaved 
flower cut in stone, and inclosed in a little square ; 
and multitudes of these squares are brought close 
together, producing a singularly rich effect. The 
lines and tracery of windows are especially elegant, 
satisfying the eye with every idea of luxuriant 
beauty. The exquisite chapel of Merton College, 
Oxford, affords throughout a splendid though 
rather diminutive example of this period. The 
windows of the Decorated style are large, com- 
posed of two, three, or more lights. The east- 
ern windows of Lichfield Cathedral are noble in- 
stances of the general splendor and delicate tracery 
of this style. The smallest corbel or finial is highly 
carved, and drops in a bunch of grapes, or a hand- 
nil of flowers. Some of the finials and crosses of 
Winchester Cathedral belonging to this epoch are 
hardly describable, so richly woven over are they 
in shooting leaves and blossoms ; they might have 
stood out neglected in some Italian or Sicilian gar- 
den for half a century of summers, and then have 
been transplanted with all their tangled wealth 
hanging about them into the temple. 

The sturdy buttresses of this style are more 
adorned than the Early English, with slender 
foliated pinnacles and canopied niches. Very 
characteristic of this epoch are niches for statues, 
with lace-work tabernacles suspended over them. 
But this is quite enough. 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 161 

The great fault of English cathedrals is want 
of height. To use an expressive word, they are 
squatty. Contrasted with the French, German, or 
Italian edifices of the same periods, this is a strik- 
ing deficiency. Give York Minster, or Lincoln 
Cathedral, or even these smaller edifices of Lich- 
field, Worcester, and Gloucester, the height of 
St. Onen, or St. Stephens at Vienna, or Milan 
Cathedral, and they would be greatly ennobled ; 
for they have enormous length, solidity, and eleva- 
tion of tower and spire, and would bear this height- 
ening of the roof. 

In Lichfield Cathedral is a monument to Lady 
Mary Wortley Montague, a small mural slab, its 
inscription adverting to her agency in introducing 
the system of inoculation into Europe. The fa- 
mous monument by Chantrey of the " Sleeping 
Children " is touching. Seeing it first by moon- 
light, it was like looking at the sweet sleep of child- 
ren in their nursery. One thinks what a start 
they would have to wake and find themselves in 
such a strange solemn place. The mother of the 
children here commemorated — (the youngest of 
whom was burned and the eldest died shortly 
after) — is still living. One does not feel like 
criticizing such a work. Its purity and innocence 
would seem to preclude all criticism. 

The traveler cannot help taking some notice of 

the more general geological features of such a 

country as England. They appear in the scenery 

and vegetation, and are most striking and varied. 
11 



162 OLD ENGLAND. 

They thrust themselves upon you ; they sculpture 
and paint themselves before the very eye. Derby- 
shire scenery (for we now come into this beautiful 
country) is as different from Devonshire scenery 
as a lily-white English maiden from a swarthy red 
Indian squaw. I stopped at the town of Derby 
long enough to see something of it, and to make 
some small purchases of carved fluor-spar and mar- 
ble. It has a pleasant site on the lovely Derwent 
River. It appeared like a prosperous agricultural 
town, the centre of a fertile region ; it formed a 
great contrast to Lichfield in its bustling streets. 
Farm-wagons, cattle and sheep, were going to and 
from market. But it was doubtless very quiet 
compared with a Derby race-day, as Leech repre- 
sents it. The race-course in which England royal 
and England plebeian, England bearded and Eng- 
land smooth-chinned delight, is upon the Notting- 
ham road. The Derby silk manufactures are said 
to be important, but the buildings themselves do 
not show signs of very considerable works. The 
most striking feature of Derby is the remarkable 
tower of All-Saints Church, running up to a great 
height, and elegantly divided into stories, or com- 
partments, with buttresses and crocketings, grow- 
ing more and more enriched as it climbs to its 
battlemented summit, and finishing with delicate 
tracery-shields and lofty pinnacles. But the church 
itself is low and small ; it is like Daniel Webster's 
head on Tom Thumb's body. Derby was the 
native town of Richardson, the novelist ; and here 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 163 

also was the home of that pure spirit, Adelaide 
Newton. 

Seventeen and a half miles further north is Mat- 
lock Bath, in the heart of the picturesque scenery 
of Derbyshire. The road lies along the Derwent 
valley, in which the peculiar charms of the Derby- 
shire landscape soon begin to appear, though of a 
softer and more rural type. But at the village of 
Ambergate, at the Ambergate and Rowsley Junc- 
tion, there bursts upon one the genuine Derbyshire 
dale scenery in all its boldness and beauty. Here 
the rocks begin rising in sheer walls from the val- 
ley ; lovely niches, or small territories of bright 
green, are shut in by rocky barriers, the river 
gliding softly between ; and I was reminded of the 
scenery in " Saxon Switzerland," but more espe- 
cially " Franconian Switzerland," frequently no- 
ticing vales that were almost the exact counterpart 
of the lovely little valley of the Wiesent, which is 
the German Tempe. But, clanking into the tun- 
nel through High Tor, we are at Matlock Bath. 

We arrived at the station just as a monstrous 
excursion train came in from the north. I drove 
slowly up the road to the hotel in the company 
of thousands, literally thousands, who were soon 
diffused over the beautiful village and its vicin- 
ity, filling the walks, scaling the cliffs, riding the 
donkeys, rowing on the river, laughing, singing, 
and apparently spending the fine day in hearty en- 
joyment. 

As the " Old Bath Hotel," famous in Matlock 



164 OLD ENGLAND. 

fashion and story, was temporarily closed, I went 
to the " New Bath Hotel," a much finer situation 
at the further end of the village, on the Cromford 
road, commanding delightful views of High Tor, 
the river, and the cliffs on the opposite side. I 
have lying before me the tariff of prices at the 
Matlock hotels. It might be well to quote it just 
to give an idea of the prices at this favorite Eng- 
lish watering-place among the hills. 

" Old Bath Hotel," W. Greaves. Bed, 2s. ; 
board per day, 6s. ; private room, 2s. 6d. ; attend- 
ance, Is. ; bed and board in public, 7s. per day. 

" New Bath Hotel," Ivatts & Jordan. Bed, 2s. ; 
breakfast, Is. 6d. to 2s. ; lunch, Is. to 2s. ; dinner, 
2s. Qd. to 3s. ; tea, Is. 8c?. to 2s. ; supper, Is. to 2s. ; 
attendance, Is. ; private rooms, 2s. 6<#., 3s., 3s. 6c?., 
4s., or 5s. ; board, 5s. 6d. per day ; sitting-rooms, 
15s. to 30s. per week ; bedrooms, 7s. to 14s. per 
week ; servants' board, 3s. Qd. per day ; maid ser- 
vants, for attendance per week on one person, 7s. ; 
on two, 12s. ; on three, 15s. ; on four, 20s. 

The garden and grounds at the Matlock Hotel 
are beautiful. How calm and restful the evenings 
spent in them, as I sat under the great lime-tree's 
shade ! The house fronts upon the river, and looks 
directly upon the gigantic wall of bald cliffs across 
the Derwent, with tufts of green or painted foliage 
upon their white perpendicular face, from which 
two great rocks swelled out like regularly builded 
round towers with bastions ; while to the left the 
deep narrow grassy vale of Matlock extended, with 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 165 

its yellow clustering stone houses, terminated by the 
sombre " Heights of Abraham," and above them 
Mount Masson, and a little beyond, at the very 
extremity of the vale, gleamed the towering and 
silvery crag of High Tor. 

The lime-tree of which I spoke merits the title 
of " magnificent." Its branches are supported by 
poles, so that it looks like a banyan-tree, and it 
covers an immense area with its grove-like shade. 
A tepid spring runs under its roots. It is a garden 
of itself, and filled the atmosphere with the sweet 
perfume of its blossoms. 

I went to see the " Old Bath Hotel " for Lord 
Byron's and Mary Chaworth's sake, who used to 
meet here during the days of his comparatively 
sincere and uncorrupted life. On making some 
remark of pity and sympathy for the poet, the 
young lady who showed us the assembly-room 
spoke out with that English positiveness so refresh- 
ing to hear, — "I have no pity nor sympathy for 
him ; he was a decidedly bad man." 

High Tor is a noble cliff, the centre and king 
of all. It is a mighty mass of limestone more than 
four hundred feet high, standing out boldly over 
the river, beautifully white in many parts of it, 
and draped at its foot with a noble growth of elms 
and sycamores ; while vines and shrubs wreathe its 
front with a tangled tracery ; the river runs at 
its base, and continues to glide swiftly on under 
the shadow of cliffs nearly as high, and of the 
same perpendicular character. To sit on the 



166 OLD ENGLAND. 

grassy river brink when the sun tinges the summits 
of these rocks with that last serene light just before 
its setting, and at the same time to watch the swift 
dark stream beneath, it seems like life flowing idly 
away under nobler lights and aims that still linger 
pensively above it. 

In the early part of the afternoon we were called 
to the window by the merry sound of music more 
animated than harmonious, and found that it ac- 
companied a long procession of all the boys and 
girls of all the Sunday-schools of the neighborhood, 
with their banners and decorations. After parad- 
ing the streets and lanes, they passed through the 
garden of our hotel into a green, sloping, mountain 
meadow just behind the house. There, with their 
teachers and pastors and pastors' wives, and fathers 
and mothers, and friends high and low, they had a 
long pleasant afternoon of sports. I sat also on the 
grass enjoying it as much as they. The boys would 
start all together from a given tree on the side of 
the meadow at the bottom of the hill, run up the 
hill, around another tree in the distance, and down 
to a given point in the centre of the field, making 
a course of half a mile or so. It was tough strain- 
ing work to get up the steep and rough hill, and I 
don't know when I have laughed more heartily than 
in watching the manoeuvres of the boys at outwitting 
and outstripping each other. After turning the tree, 
thev streamed down like a herd of deer, one slim 
bright- cheeked boy leading them all in most gallant 
style. He, of course, took the prize. There were 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 167 

also foot-races among the girls, and full as much 
earnestness and competition were shown by them. 
There were leaping-bars, leap-frog, and other games 
that brought out skill, strength, and activity. The 
trial that created the most interest was climbing a 
greased pole. Boy after boy bravely essayed to 
pull the streamers on the top of that taper mast. 
Some would get up a few feet, some half way, some 
nearly to the top, and be obliged to give up in spite 
of every encouragement and pelting of sugar-plums 
from below. The writhing motions, the red grin- 
ning faces, the pantaloons pulled up over the knees, 
the bold hot beginnings, and the desperate elutch- 
ings at the end, were ludicrous enough, for nothing 
in creation is more comical than a boy, as well as 
nothing more beautiful in certain moods. One sun- 
faced, sturdy little Hodge nearly did it, but though 
within two inches of his object, and straining for 
dear life, he had to slide down. A good-looking 
larger youth at last succeeded in pulling the rib- 
bons, amid loud shouts and cheerings. A wealthy 
lady of the parish I understood had provided the 
afternoon's amusement for the children. The cler- 
gymen present managed all the sports, and adjudi- 
cated some of the prizes, which must have been 
very acceptable to the poorer children. This was 
one instance of many which I have noticed in Eng- 
land, of a very cheerful and natural tone of religious 
feeling. I am certain that we sometimes war 
against nature and grace in shutting up the currents 
of flay, or what may be called pure enjoyment, in 



168 OLD ENGLAND. 

our type of piety. A good hearty laugh now and 
then that expands the pent breast, and makes the 
blood circulate freely, is better than a handful of 
" greenbacks." It has gone so far with us that when 
we lash ourselves up to really enjoy ourselves, and to 
play, it is very sad work. We are soon tired of it. 
But the soul can hardly be sound and healthy if 
the springs of joy are not sometimes touched. They 
may otherwise take inner, tortuous, and evil chan- 
nels, as we have seen streams in a limestone coun- 
try like Derbyshire, wearing out for themselves 
tremendous caverns under the mountains, until they 
fall into some horrid chasm and disappear forever. 
Following a charming road along the Derwent, 
with the gray grit-stone cliffs that descend into and 
form the mighty ramparts of Matlock Dale on one 
side, we came in sight of "Lea Hurst," the home 
of Florence Nightingale, not far from the villages 
of Lea and Holloway. It stands on a wooded hill 
forming the termination or higher summit of a most 
glorious valley, with crag, mountain, dark forest, 
glistening river, and green pasture-land spread be- 
fore it. The scenery though beautiful is wild and 
free, fitted to inspire fresh thoughts. The house at 
a distance appears embosomed in woods and vines, 
and stands just on the skirts of a thick park. An 
open lawn slopes away down from it. It is an Eliz- 
abethan structure of cruciform shape, with quaint 
gables and square-headed windows. One great 
bay-window, in particular, overhung by an enor- 
mous wealth of ivy, is impressed on my memory. 



LICHFIELD TO MATLOCK. 169 

It is one of those incomparable English homes, in 
the midst of a nature where every thing that this 
world can yield of grand without and exquisite 
within seems to be combined. Here " the Sol- 
dier's Friend " was reared. Her family has an- 
other fine place in Hampshire called " Embley 
Park," but in a more plain and rural county. 
She was born in Florence in 1820. Her paternal 
name (changed to Nightingale in 1815) is Shore, 
an ancient Derbyshire family. Her mother was 
the daughter of William Smith of Norwich, a well- 
known friend of Slave Emancipation. We learned 
in the neighborhood that Florence Nightingale had 
begun to do good at home among the sick, poor, 
and ignorant. She went when thirty-one to Kai- 
serwerth on the Rhine, to learn in that school of 
the Protestant " Sisters of Mercy " the method of 
training nurses for the sick, and she has written an 
account of this institution. She next applied her 
energies to renovating the Hospital for Sick Gov- 
ernesses in Harley Street, London. She also was 
greatly interested in the ragged schools springing 
up at that time. Then came the Crimean war, and 
the world knows the rest. Over all the gloomy 
and magnificent memories of that great city of Con- 
stantinople her Christian acts shine. The smell of 
fever and corruption is said to have tainted the air 
all around the Barrack Hospital at Scutari. But 
fever itself seizing upon her own slender frame, 
could not drive her from her post. The talent, 
strength of nerve, and wonderful tact shown in re- 



170 OLD ENGLAND. 

organizing that mass of ill-regulated hospital ser- 
vice was as remarkable as her personal devotion to 
the sick. She made no distinction in creeds in her 
choice of nurses, and this subjected her to a mean 
attack upon her religious opinions, and from a sin- 
gular quarter, — a clergyman of the Established 
Church. Should the secret chamber in every one's 
breast, which no other has a right to enter, be 
opened, it would probably be found that Miss 
Nightingale's religion was just that which all true 
Christians should possess, — "a deedful faith." 

"Life is joy, and love is power; 
Death all fetters doth unbind : 
Strength and wisdom only flower 
When we toil for all our kind." 



CHAPTER X. 

MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 

I continued on to " Wingfield Manor," a rained 
castellated house of the powerful Earl of Shrews- 
bury, whose wife was the famous " Countess Bess." 
These ruins are in the highest degree picturesque, 
the more so because they are so utterly neglected, 
and so different in this respect from other English 
tenderly nursed and " well-preserved ruins." They 
stand on an eminence thickly wooded, in the cen- 
tre of a circle of green and lovely hills which 
Mary Stuart looked out upon when kept here 
for nine years captive ; though if we should be- 
lieve all that the guide-books here and there say, 
the unfortunate queen must have lingered in cap- 
tivity some half a century in England before her 
death. There is some rich carving still left about 
the windows and doors of the chapel, overgrown 
as it is with weeds and thistles ; but trees of nearly 
a century's growth shoot up where Mary's apart- 
ments once were. Cows and sheep feed around 
the inclosure of the walls. The house was de- 
stroyed by the Parliamentary army, or, as they 
told me, by Cromwell, who, if he did personally all 
that he is said to have done, must have been not 
only a hundred-armed, but hundred-legged Eng- 
lish " Seeva." 



172 OLD ENGLAND. 

Our way lay led through the village of Crich, 
where there are extensive lead mines — a bleak 
place seated on tire very apex of the hills, the 
old black stone church keeping watch on its lofty 
height over a vast panorama. I saw in the dis- 
tance " Hardwick Hall," one of the many do- 
mains of the Duke of Devonshire. Coming around 
over the desolate tract of Tansley Moor, we re- 
turned to the pleasant hotel and old lime-tree at 
Matlock Bath. 

The little river Wye is said to be a capital trout 
stream ; I should like to have whipped it a little 
by way of trial. It has not the volume and flow 
of its noble namesake in Monmouthshire, but it is 
a pretty amber-colored stream that stops and plays 
with every thing on its way, — 

" Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge, 
He overtaketh on his pilgrimage." 

Our way lay along this lovely little river, through 
a valley of fertile meadow land with gentle hills on 
either side, where the cattle were quietly feeding, 
and though the rest of the world might be con- 
vulsed by war, here all was peace. 

The first sight of Haddon Hall, standing bold and 
high across the river, set off by its background of 
woods — a sudden vision of the past, with nothing 
but simple Nature around, and nothing to recall 
those changes that have made it an object of pecul- 
iar mark — was impressive ; but the impression 
was not deepened by a near acquaintance. Cross- 
ing a three-arched bridge, we drove up to the 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 173 

lodge, and were shown into the castle by an elfin, 
who opened the big oak door of the frowning gate- 
way tower with a key almost as long as her bare 
arm. This heavy tower of the time of Edward 
III., casting a broad shadow, is the most majestic 
part of the edifice ; and at this portal the scene of 
Edwin Landseer's picture is laid. The house is 
now the property of the Duke of Rutland. Before 
the Manners family possessed it, it was the seat of 
the Vernon family ; and in the days of Sir George 
Vernon, styled " King of the Peak," this place 
was in its greatest magnificence. The courtyard 
is not large. The chaplain's room is first shown, 
as well as the chapel, to illustrate the tight corner 
into which religion was pushed and kept locked up 
in those times. These apartments, and their very 
keeping and situation, go to verify Macaulay's pict- 
ure of that rude and unlettered period. Passing 
over into the old dining-room, and kitchen with its 
huge iron spit, one sees plainly enough around 
what centre the whole house revolved. In the 
dining-hall there is the rough oak table, raised a 
step for the lord and his family : but he seems to 
have eaten with his retainers and people, who 
only sat " below the salt," with a kind of savage 
brotherhood even in those haughty days. When 
any one failed of drinking his share he was fastened 
up by his hands to an iron staple in the wall, and 
cold water was poured down his sleeve. Of course 
they would not think of pouring it down his throat. 
Haddon Hall is wonderfully preserved in all its 



174 OLD ENGLAND. 

parts. The faded arras is hanging in the cham- 
bers. The little lead-soldered windows swing open 
to let in the spicy air from the cedar and fir trees, 
as in the old time. From these panneled rooms, 
and the great hall sprinkled with carved " boars' 
heads and peacocks," and the state bed-chamber, 
and the " Peveril Tower," and the terraced garden, 
and the yew-trees, and the grotesque gothic orna- 
ments of the outer and inner courts, it would not 
be difficult to reconstruct a baronial residence of 
the 15th or 16th century. The long line of crene- 
lated walls and towers, low but solid, form, even 
now a perfect mediaeval picture. But though there 
are some striking points and views, most things are 
stiff, creaking, and dismal ; and with the gloomy 
forest hanging around and above on a wild winter 
night, it must be a rare place for the imagination 
of a poet like Keats to play freaks in. Poor Keats ! 
why should we always think of him as one who 
could have written such great things ! He was a 
true English poet ; and his Greece was laid in the 
heart of green England, — in scenery not unlike 
this softly wild, rocky, verdurous, lonely Derby- 
shire. 

The Bakewell Church, which illustrates Haddon 
Hall as St. Mary's Church does Warwick Castle, 
is worth visiting on its own account. Some parts 
of it have been thought to be of Saxon origin, but 
Saxon architecture has, I believe, been pretty 
much given up by the learned as something that 
belongs, like " many-towered Camelot," to Tenny- 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 175 

son's poetty and the legendary age of England. It 
is supposed, however, that a church stood here 
before the Conquest. There is a very decided 
look about the present edifice, of a more modern 
church having been built upon an extremely an- 
cient one, which was plain and solid, without 
ornament. It is a quarry of antiquity for the 
ecclesiologist. There is a Runic cross in the 
churchyard, as well as at Eyam Church, not far 
distant. Many fragments of very curious tomb- 
stones, probably Saxon, have been discovered in 
digging under the church. But the later monu- 
ments in the Vernon and Manners chapel are the 
most singular. They are composed of colored life- 
size stone or alabaster figures. A mother with 
her w T hole family of kneeling sons and daughters 
down to mere babies, in black dresses, and having 
an intensely strong family likeness, rise pyramid- 
ically upon one immense monument or tablet. The 
effigies of John Manners and Dorothy Vernon, his 
wife, whose romantic history enlivens the stones 
and shades of Haddon Hall, are upon the opposite 
monument. An elaborate alabaster recumbent 
statue of Sir Thomas Wendesley, representing him 
in full armor, is interesting as illustrating costume. 

Chatsworth is a place so well known, that I 
cannot attempt to write much about it. Its situa- 
tion in the queenly valley of the Derwent, framed 
in on one side with perpendicular hills fading away 
in the blue distance, and by an ancient park on 
the other, with broad rich meadows, an unlimited 



176 OLD ENGLAND. 

sweep of soft green turf dotted by cattle and deer, 
and a noble river between, giving an opportunity 
for picturesque stone bridges, — these afford it a 
majestic setting, and a superiority in this respect to 
all other such residences in England, or indeed out 
of England. It is an Italian palace, a modern 
Hadrian's villa, set in English scenery. Its great 
idea is amplitude and a kind of imperial breadth 
and opulence. It looks too rich and magnifi- 
cent for comfort, and give me "Wilton House" 
or " Warwick Castle " — (if such a painful choice 
must be made) — to live in in preference. As it is, 
a few servants inhabit Chatsworth, look out of its 
plate-glass windows, smell its roses, and walk its 
grand avenues along the river, — its lord not choos- 
ing to live in it but a short time in the year. 

The character of the mansion is entirely modern. 
This Italian villa style may possibly suit the broad 
open peaceful site better than a castellated house, 
or an irregular Elizabethan structure. 

Of all its works of Art, old and new, I was most 
struck with the little picture of a Benedictine Con- 
vent, or " Monks at Prayer." Its vigorous light 
and shade is worthy of Rembrandt. It is one of 
those modern pictures that we feel sure will be 
celebrated in future times, when ten thousand more 
ambitious paintings and their authors shall have 
gone into oblivion. 

The sculpture gallery again reminds us of Italy 
in England. Canova, in his " Mother of Napo- 
leon," Hebe and Endymion, is here in his almost 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 177 

Grecian perfection of power and beanty. His head 
of Napoleon differs from every other that I have 
seen. It is a long pointed face, with much more 
of Italian craft than is common. It was pleasant 
to see the countenance of our own Everett, hy 
Hiram Powers, among the busts there. Derby- 
shire spar and marble are greatly used in the orna- 
mentation of the whole building. 

In the vast and varied garden the fruit of Sir 
Joseph Paxton's skill, though all the rules of 
beauty, surprise, and concealment were observed, 
there was not a free expression of Nature. Nature 
will not be forced by the command of wealth, or 
might of art. The artificial rocks had an obsti- 
nately exotic look ; they seemed to say, " We are 
not where our Author placed us, but we are here 
to serve the Duke of Devonshire." 

Buxton is fourteen miles from Chats worth. The 
road lies among green vales and hills, well wooded 
with ash, fir, and oak, but growing wilder and 
drearier as one went north, and especially in ap- 
proaching Buxton and passing through the stern 
mountain gorge under Chee Tor. Here the gray 
limestone rocks rose in the same wall-like escarped 
fashion of which we have spoken. We kept along 
by our new and lovely little friend the river Wye, 
now become a very child in slenderness and freak- 
ish babbling wantonness ; for we were approaching 
its babyhood and cradlehood among the high moor- 
lands above Buxton. 

This northern Spa among the hills, nearly a 
12 



178 OLD ENGLAND. 

thousand feet above the sea, is a strikingly situated 
place, in a deep hollow or bowl of the mountains, 
hemmed in by bleak desolate scenery. Words- 
worth in his " Excursion " speaks of " Buxton's 
dreary heights." But here in this lonely and dis- 
mal region rises a very stately and fashionable little 
metropolis. Its great " Crescent Hotel " is one of 
the wonders of the land. To 'look down upon it 
from the top of the opposite hill, in the evening, 
when fully lighted, it appears like an illuminated 
Coliseum cut in two. It was built bv the late Duke 
of Devonshire at the cost of £ 120,000, and in fact 
comprises several hotels, dwellings, and a multitude 
of shops. The bathing and pump establishments 
of Buxton are altogether the most luxurious and 
superb I have seen. Besides elegant private bath- 
rooms, there are immense porcelain swimming 
basins of tepid water beautifully crystalline and 
transparent, though of a bluish tinge. The water 
in the pump-rooms comes out of the mouths of 
white porcelain swans. 

The winding walks, the gardens, the stables, are 
all on the same scale of opulence. 

At the " table d'hote " of St. Ann's Hotel (which 
is a singular innovation in English hotels), and in 
the handsome drawing-room around the card-tables, 
one sees all descriptions of decrepitude and disease, 
cripples, paralytics, dyspeptics, rheumatics, and 
gouty people with their feet in flannels and slippers. 
Wealth and luxury must take their special share of 
these ills. But there are other water establishments 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 179 

"intended especially for the poorer class of invalids. 
That which is called the " Buxton Bath Charity " 
is supported by the subscription of visitors, a gift of 
<£10 entitling the donor to have one patient on the 
list for life. 

The water is a mild saline mineral, not unpleas- 
ant to the taste, and without odor. Its base is car- 
bonate of lime and magnesia. At the moment of 
its issue from the spring it is highly charged with 
nitrogen. 

Buxton was a bathing-place of the bath-loving 
Romans, and old Roman roads have been found ra- 
diating from it as from a centre. Buxton has also 
its memories of Mary Queen of Scots, who was fre- 
quently here during her English captivity. 

The famous name of " Peveril of the Peak," 
which Walter Scott seized upon with the aptitude 
of genius and turned it to his own account, is the 
ancient " genius loci" of Derbyshire. All that is 
historic and legendary in this whole region culmi- 
nates in this ubiquitous personality throned among 
the hills ; for he built the old tower of Haddon 
Hall, he ruled at Chatsworth, and he had for his 
especial seat the eagle-nest that overhangs the tre- 
mendous precipices of the " Devil's Cave." Pev- 
eril was a natural son of William the Conqueror. 

To this same William Peveril all this territory 
of Derbyshire was given, the northern part gradu- 
ally rising into lofty heights taking the name of 
" the Peak." It is a naked rocky region full of 
mineral riches and marvels, with immense unex- 



180 OLD ENGLAND. 

plored caves, intermittent springs, "shivering" 
mountains, and mines of silver, lead, and* "Blue 
John." 

From Buxton to Castleton is twelve miles. Part 
of the way we followed the old Roman road that 
penetrated into this mining district, especially to the 
Odin lead mine, which is still worked. It lies over 
sullen and desolate hills, appearing more so perhaps 
from the coal-black clouds that hung menacingly 
low upon the scene, but which toward noon broke 
away, the sun coming out with great heat. Before 
arriving at Castleton we passed around the foot of 
Mam Tor, or "the shivering mountain," a shaly 
crumbling hill 800 feet high, and so called from its 
continual self-wrought process of disintegration. 

The " Blue John mine," which is the only local- 
ity where large masses of this beautiful fluor-spar 
are found, lies just here at the foot of Mam Tor. 
Its walls have a sparry lustre, and on going a little 
way in, there comes a profound gulf which one 
looks down into with respectful awe. But none of 
these Derbyshire caverns could compare, I thought, 
with the cave at Adelsburg near Trieste, where 
Milan Cathedral itself is reproduced, with its myr- 
iad arches, and clustering columns, and fretted pin- 
nacles, and snowy images, in the dark bosom of a 
mountain. 

Descending by a steep road from this point, 
which commands a broad panorama, we came into 
a valley, on the southern side of which, cowering in 
the shade of a high hill, is the little village of Cas- 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 181 

tleton. It is half a mining place and half a curios- 
ity-shop, with small stone houses and one old 
church, and abounding in boys and old men, ready 
to conduct to the " Peak Castle," the " Peak Cav- 
ern," " Speedwell Mine," or " Cave Dale." 

After the conventional luncheon of the season, 
mutton-chops and salad crowned by the cavernous 
u Stilton cheese," I took a guide to the veritable 
Peveril of the Peak Castle. This guide w x as half an 
idiot, and though perfectly familiar with the way, 
left me of course to my own intelligence respecting 
all other things. He wanted to impress upon me 
that he, " Johnny Here, was always here, and that 
Johnny was a good guide." 

The climb to these old blackened ruins on the 
lofty hill just back of the village, was a steep one, 
and the grass dry and slippery. But the site of 
the castle is fine. It commands a wide though 
desolate view over this upper and rugged portion 
of Derbyshire. Of the castle itself, little remains 
but a low broken wall running around the edge of 
the cliff, two almost totally ruined towers, and a 
somewhat better preserved portion of the ponderous 
keep, which probably resisted the efforts of those 
who would quarry stones from it, for the building 
of houses below in the village. It is of oldest Nor- 
man work, with small round arched doorways and 
windows, and is massive enough to satisfy all the 
demands of the imagination. On three sides the 
castle overhung profound abysses, and must have 
been in its day impregnable. The sheep now ram- 



182 OLD ENGLAND. 

ble over its empty courtyard and old stones. The 
mention of this castle in the " Doomsday Book " is 
said to be in these words : " Terra Castelli William 
Peverell in Pecke fors." 

The visit to " Peak Cavern " beneath was some- 
what exciting to those of the party who had never 
been before so far into the bowels of the earth. It 
is indeed a formidable earth-throat. The perpen- 
dicular walls of gray rock rise on either side of it 
and above it six hundred feet, and it opens with a 
black arch forty-two feet in height, one hundred 
and twenty in width, and three hundred in depth. 
It is such a cave as Pluto's chariot might issue 
from. A little stream flows from this sombre vault. 
On one side of this chasm, just under its great cor- 
nice, stands a hut where a woman is said to have 
lived to very old age, never sleeping away from it 
but once in her life. In the dim light we saw tall 
poles and lines stretched across them, where a num- 
ber of men and women were at work making twine. 
Taking a guide, and groping into the cave until the 
roof sloped down to the inner wall, we went through 
a little door which opened into a long passage with 
hardly a ray of light, this leading into a large 
apartment where we lighted our lamps, and then 
passed on through passage after passage, hall after 
hall, till we came to the " Bell House," which was 
like being under a vast bell, the roof taking a regu- 
lar pear-shaped dome form. Soon after this we ar- 
rived at the " First Water," which is sometimes an 
impassable pond filling up the whole passage, but it 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 183 

was now so low that we could creep along comfort- 
ably by the side of it. Then we scrambled over wet 
stones and under low archways, with the solemn 
sound of this " Cocytus " murmuring below us in 
the depths of the mountain, until we came to a grand 
chamber two hundred and ten feet broad, two hun- 
dred and twenty long, and one hundred and twenty 
high, with heavy arches like those of a stupendous 
Norman crypt. Here the old iron-handed Pe per- 
ils above might have laid their dead in a more aw- 
ful and magnificent sepulchre than any that their an- 
cestors possessed. And it seemed a pity that Scott 
should never have visited this place, for he certainly 
would have made something out of this cavern. 
He might have hid his Puritan here, and what a 
terrible scene might have been wrought out of the 
sudden rising of the subterranean river, as is fre- 
quently the case, cutting off the escape of those 
who were in pursuit. We went on 2250 feet into 
the mountain, where the end of the cave is reached 
and the river disappears. This cavern is in some 
way connected with the " Speedwell mines " a mile 
distant, for the debris of that mine is occasionally 
brought down in this direction. The whole region 
here is hollow and undermined. On returning, the 
little daughter of the guide, gliding around like a 
spirit, caused a surprise by placing lamps here and 
there, imitating the light of day, while we were yet 
far in the hill. The real light of day, when we 
came out of the darkness, seemed to be something 
golden, the beauty of which I had never seen be- 



184 OLD ENGLAND. 

fore, excepting in a similar emergence from a deep 
cavern into the sweet sunshine of heaven. 

In the " Cotton Metropolis " I took up my abode 
at Queen's Hotel, one of the largest hotels in 
Great Britain, though there was the slightest sus- 
picion about it of that kind of upholstery splendor, 
which one sees less rarely in England, but perhaps 
more frequently in America in our great manu- 
facturing towns. Dinner served in sumptuous 
style, was followed by a course of " Times" news- 
paper, " Chronicle," and " Punch." Indeed a 
traveler in England soon gets as infatuated after his 
evening newspaper as an Englishman, and almost 
like an Englishman does not know what his own 
opinion is until he has read the " Times." One is 
drawn to read English newspapers for their good 
vigorous English. English newspapers deal in 
facts and ideas more than in rhetoric and personali- 
ties. They base their articles upon broad princi- 
ples of political economy, trade, or morals. Even 
a little blotchy penny-sheet like the " Telegraph," 
has a daily leader that for pithy English, compre- 
hensive and penetrating political views and weighty 
logic, would set up a member of Parliament or of 
Congress as an accomplished speaker. There is no 
doubting the fact that England is a free country 
by him who reads English newspapers. Even to 
a Republican used to free speech they often sound 
surprisingly bold. They may be imperious, harsh, 
unjust, wrong, and bitterly controversial, yet they 
do speak right out, and as a German writer has 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 185 

said, " A noisv irritable debating; nation does not 
prove that liberty is crushed, but a quiet and silent 
nation does." 

A Sunday in England ! There is doubtless 
great formality and great desecration of the day; 
but a day for the worship of the Most High, 
a day on which the shuttle ceases, the shop is 
closed, the house of God is filled with apparently 
devout assemblies, — this is above all things char- 
acteristic of England, in city or country. Other 
nations laugh at England for this, but the recogni- 
tion of the Sabbath is a simple and sublime ac- 
knowledgment by the nation, of God. God must 
be in the life of a nation as of a man to make it 
great. The faith of England is a spring of char- 
acter and a source of strength, that some philoso- 
phers do not always sufficiently take into account 
in their ingenious and profound estimates of Eng- 
lish traits. It is deeper than all. Race, soil, posi- 
tion, history, are nothing to it. It is that invisible 
stream of truth, duty, and hope, that runs from the 
eternal heart. In a great sweating, working city 
like Manchester, the universal and marked regard 
of the Sabbath has something touching in it. It 
is poetry to worship God in the green lanes where 
there is peace and loveliness, and every thing to 
draw out the soul to sing praise ; but it is affecting 
in the presence of want, of squalid poverty, of the 
ugly barren features of a huge manufacturing town 
in its joyless life and ofttimes awful despair, to see 
the myriad hands of toil raised to the Father of all, 



186 OLD ENGLAND. 

and to hear the sounds of Christian joy and praise. 
I recall some words of Macaulay on this point: 
" While industry is suspended, while the plough 
rests in the furrow, while the exchange is silent, 
while no smoke ascends from the factory, a process 
is going on quite as important to the wealth of 
nations as any that is performed on busier days. 
Man, the machine of machines, compared with 
which all the contrivances of the Watts and Ark- 
wrights are worthless, is repairing and winding up : 
so that he returns to his labors on Monday with 
clearer intellect, with livelier spirit, and with re- 
newed corporeal vigor." 

The streets were thronged with little children 
going to and from their various schools. It was a 
sultry day, and the operatives cleanly dressed sat 
quietly in their door-ways, the men generally in 
their shirt-sleeves. They looked to me pale and 
worn. It was good to see them resting for a little 
time from their bone-wearing and monotonous toil. 
The poor children of the manufacturing cities are 
the greatest objects of compassion. The multi- 
plicity of laborers in England and their consequent 
low wages, lead parents to put their children very 
early into factories where the hard work and con- 
finement are terrible. They have been known to 
begin labor at the tender age of five, and I have 
seen it stated that bovs and girls from eight to 
fifteen are obliged to labor in factories and work- 
houses eighteen hours a day. But now, at this still 
hour, there seemed to be, at least to a looker-on, 
something like repose to the weary. 



MATLOCK TO MANCHESTER. 187 

I took a long walk to hear Canon Hugh Stowell 
preach in Christ Church, Salford. The text was 
from the Epistle to the Galatians, vi. 15. His 
sentences were extremely sententious. The first 
two I remember were these : " A man will mve 
every thing to God but his heart. God will have 
nothing from man without his heart." He argued 
upon the essential falseness of a baptismal, ritual, 
credal, sentimental, or moral piety. Faith was a 
new life. It was God dwelling in us as a living 
principle of pure emotion, right thought, and be- 
nevolent action. To criticize so good and noble a 
sermon were hardly fair ; but its style ran often 
into poetic commonplace, and did not retain the 
nervous masculine march with which it becan. 
And one cannot but long in the English pulpit for 
the free elbow, the bold and graceful sweep of the 
arm, that is seen in the French pulpit, be it that of 
Lacordaire or Cocquerel, and also in the most 
effective American preaching and oratory. There 
is a trussed look, a gesturing with the hand, instead 
of the arm. In the afternoon I heard an Inde- 
pendent minister in a most humble and obscure 
brick building, with nothing on the exterior to dis- 
tinguish it from an old black cotton warehouse. A 
few sheep were gathered in this lowly sheepfold. 
The preacher was a thin, pale man, who prayed 
fervently for the crowds of those who had not the 
bread of life in that swarming city, for the poor, 
the sinful, and the tempted. He preached an earn- 
est but sad sermon. Yet perhaps he was one of 



188 OLD ENGLAND. 

the few who in the eye of God saved the city — 
whose prayers filled the golden vials before the 
throne. I could not help fancying that even the 
sight of one stranger rather cheered the little 
flock. 

Of course I do not mean to speak of a Man- 
chester Sabbath as any thing peculiar. If I had 
penetrated into the back lanes of Ancoats, and the 
less public parts of the city, I should probably have 
found the gin palaces in full swing, and profane- 
ness and gross vice enough. But to the transient 
stranger the day was apparently kept holy, and the 
great tired city rested from its labors. 



CHAPTER XL 

THE LAKE COUNTRY. 

A lively and pretty scene was that miniature 
Bowness Bay, on beautiful Lake Windermere, with 
its fleet of tiny yachts, their pennants flying, and 
its array of gayly cushioned pleasure-boats. A 
pleasant-looking boatman touched his hat, and we 
were soon out of the crowd of small craft and vora- 
cious swans, the rapid-winged boat cutting its way 
over the lake, smooth and black as Egyptian mar- 
ble, toward the " Ferry Inn," some little way 
down on the opposite side. While we were run- 
ning over, there were indications of the sultry day 
ending in a thunder-storm, and two or three rum- 
bles of thunder broke among the hills. The tall 
mountains at the head of the lake grew misty, and 
the son shining through the clouds that piled up 
swiftly around it, showed like an immense St. An- 
drew's cross. A considerable swell followed the 
gusts that began to sweep down the lake, but our 
boatman thought it would soon pass over, as it did. 
We neared tho great craggy wall on the opposite 
side, about a mile across, skirting along its base, 
until we came to the promontory of Ferry Inn, 
marked by its conspicuous clump of sycamores. 



190 OLD ENGLAND. 

Here we could see nearly the whole reach of the 
lake, which is ten miles long. In shape it is not 
unlike " Long Lake " in Northern New York, but 
how unlike the shaggy sides and setting of that 
rude though beautiful Indian water ! Everywhere 
the hand of taste has smoothed the shores of this 
English lake. At every point where there is a 
foothold, some noble dwelling is placed, its rolled 
lawn or its majestic park coming down to the very 
water's edge. But the lakes of the Adirondack 
region, in point of size and other features, might 
bear some comparison with these English lakes, 
especially with the rockier and sterner ones. Per- 
haps in future times those rough emeralds of the 
mountains, where now nought is heard but the 
plaintive cry of the loon, or the plashing of the 
wild deer among the lilies, will be built upon, and 
become the homes of poets and the resorts of trav- 
elers, artists, and health-seekers. But there is 
something exquisitely soft in Windermere. It has 
a feminine delicacy, and with its light touches of 
beauty draws out the fatigue from the weary brain. 
It does not want in largeness and grandeur toward 
its upper end. As we came around Curwen 
Island, on our return, we had a clearer view of the 
northern extremity of the lake. Fairfield Moun- 
tain stood out distinct and dark against the sky, and 
just under it on either side Rydal Head and Nab 
Scar, with Wansfell Pike and the Kentmere range 
of hills on the right. But toward the south it 
faded away in wavy and gentle lines. 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 191 

We landed upon Curwen Island, or Belle Isle, 
the largest island in the lake, a choice ring of 
springy turf and ancient trees, of about a mile in 
circumference. Christopher North has immortal- 
ized it, for the most beautiful Nature is dead until 
a human soul starts it to life by its living touch and 
sympathy. " We see then as we feel," Words- 
worth said. There is a circular stone mansion 
upon this island more odd than tasteful. Clear it 
away and restore it to fresh Nature, and we can- 
not conceive of a more dreamy or poetic "Aiden " 
in a small compass, than this island. Other lit- 
tle " aits " of vivid green are strung along to the 
south of it ; their leaning branches sweep the 
water, and upon their shallower sides they are 
fringed with a white border of water-lilies. 

The next day, though showery, gave glimpses of 
the lake from higher ground, in and back of Bow- 
ness, taking in the majestic horns of the two Lang- 
dale Pikes at the north, and just opposite, the 
ridge of Furness Fells, crowned by the indented 
peak of Coniston Old Man, with a dim and distant 
view of Scawfell Pike, the highest mountain in 
England. Just beyond this high wall of table-land 
across the lake, lies the long, parallel lake called 
Coniston Water, having much the character of 
Windermere, though smaller. Between the two 
is the minute lake of Esthwaite, only two miles in 
length, upon the borders of which Wordsworth 
went to school, and from which his life-like descrip- 
tion of skating in the " Prelude " is drawn. 



192 OLD ENGLAND. 

I drove down into Troutbeck Valley, crossing 
the bridge that went over Troutbeck stream. It is 
strange how in hilly countries the very names grow 
beautiful and suggestive. We have seen this in 
the Dovedales and Derwentdales of Derbyshire. 
In the Lothian and Tweed countries we find such 
sweet, melodious names as Melrose, Yarrow, Lam- 
mermoor, Gala Water, — 

" To Auchindenny's hazel shade, 
And moss-crowned Woodhouselee." 

In the lake region also we find names that it seems 
as if poets must have made expressly for the places, 
instead of these making the poets. Troutbeck, 
Patterdale, Windermere, Hartstope, Furness Fells, 
Leatheswater, Grasmere, Silver How, Helvellyn, 
Helm Crag, Bleaberry Fell, Glaramara, Ulleswa- 
ter — in truth, there is no end to them. How 
could they have sprung or flowed forth, except 
from the real poetry in the heart of the primitive 
people ; and as this is a kind of faint Wordsworth- 
ian idea, so we must be drawing near the home of 
the poet ! 

This Troutbeck Valley into which we have en- 
tered is a deep and picturesque hollow, running 
under the southeast side of Wansfell Pike (Peak), 
up toward the steep of Woundsdale Head, where 
there is a path that turns to the left into the Kirk- 
stone Pass. The secluded village of Troutbeck 
stands some way down this valley, and a mile and 
a half above the bridge. 

Wordsworth's own home is a drive of a mile and 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 193 

a quarter from Ambleside. By a still pleasanter 
and somewhat longer walk nearer in under the 
heights of Lochrigg Fell, — that we may be sure 
Wordsworth often took, — we may go past the 
embowered cottage of Dr. Arnold, — Fox How, — 
situated just beneath the Fell, and looking directly 
up the great hollow bosom of Fairfield Mountain. 
How often does Dr. Arnold refer to this mountain 
nest ! He says in one place in a characteristic 
way, " Behind we run up to the top of Lochrigg, 
and we have a mountain pasture in a basin, on the 
summit of the ridge, the very image of those ' Sal- 
thus ' on Citheron, where GEdipus was found by 
the Corinthian shepherd. The Wordsworths' 
friendship, for so I may call it, is certainly one of 
the greatest delights of Fox How, and their kind- 
ness in arranging every thing in our absence has 
been very great." 

His delight at getting home from a foreign tour 
he expresses in a lively way : "Arrived at Bow- 
ness at 8.20 ; left it at 8.31 ; passing Rayrigg 
gate 8.37. On the Bowness Terrace 8.45. Over 
Troutbeck Bridge 8.51. Here is Ecclerigg 8.58. 
And here Lowood Inn 9.04<^. And here Water- 
head, and our ducking bench 9.12. The Valley 
opens, Ambleside and Rydal Park, and the gallery 
on Loughrigg. Rotha Bridge 9.16. And here is 
the poor humbled Rotha, and Mr. Brancker's cut, 
and the new Millar Bridge 9.21 — alas ! for the 
alders are gone, and succeeded by a stiff wall. 
Here is the Rotha in his own beauty, and here is 

13 



194 OLD ENGLAND. fc 

poor T. Fleming's field, and our own mended gate. 
Dearest children, may we meet happily ! Entered 
Fox How and the beech copse at 9.25, and here 
ends journal. Walter first saw us, and gave no- 
tice of our approach. We found all our dear chil- 
dren well, and Fox How in such beauty, that no 
scene in Italy appeared in my eyes comparable to 
it." 

What names have we gathered as we go along ! 
As the mountains rise here above the rest of Eng- 
land so do the minds that have clustered here. 
How much they have done to refresh the plains ! 

Rydal village stands in the hollow between 
Loughrigg Fell and Nab Scar, near the lower end 
of Rydal Water ; and a little up the side of Nab 
Scar, which rises bare and majestic, furrowed with 
the marks of torrents and avalanches — high 
enough, in fact, to take it out and lift it into a 
commanding position — is the house where Words- 
worth lived. Somewhat further on, in the same 
ascending road, is Rydal Hall, the seat of the De 
Flemings, surrounded by an antique forest so often 
mentioned in the poet's verse, and in Wilson's 
exquisite prose-poems. Rydal Mount was closed 
when I was there, shortly after the death of Mrs. 
Wordsworth. I looked at the little yellow plas- 
tered house, peeping over its thick girdle of larch- 
trees and laburnum bushes. It seems to have been 
ingeniously set aside out of the common road, 
though not completely isolated. It is a kind of 
bird's-nest upon the rugged bosom of the mountain. 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 195 

Interlaced around it with care are all species of 
thickly growing shrubs and vines. Its front win- 
dows have a splendid prospect over the deeply 
scooped vale of Rydal Water and Grasmere, and 
the mountains beyond. It is a very plain and 
almost rough dwelling externally, though with a 
peerless site. An American friend who had been 
kindly entertained by Wordsworth told me that it 
was furnished with every English comfort, but with 
no luxuries beyond the presence of books and flow- 
ers. It was the abode of a man who in his own 
words applied to another, " united plain living with 
high thinking." My friend said that the poet, he 
could hardly tell why, reminded him of Henry 
Clay. I suppose from all accounts he must have 
looked as much like an old bald eagle in his milder 
meditative mood as any thing else. Hazlitt, less 
reverentially, compared his long head and face to 
that of an old white horse ! He was at that time 
in a state of irritation about his American bonds, 
and spoke strongly of the moral wrong of repudia- 
tion, and expressed his fears lest American nobility 
and faith might become swamped in materialism. 
The only thing yet done, I believe, about repudi- 
ating these Mississippi bonds in which the poet was 
fettered, has been to talk about it. But in inde- 
pendence and comparative wealth here he lived 
with his little familv. and that sister whom he so 
much loved — the feminine correlative of his own 
mind, and more than all the other nine to him. 
How many other great men besides Wordsworth, 



196 OLD ENGLAND. 

Lamb, and Neander, have had such guardian spirits 
in their sisters ? Perhaps my reader may remem- 
ber more. At the bottom of this same steep lane, 
running up out of the village, is the chapel where 
Wordsworth was a constant attendant. He had 
an Englishman's respect for the services of God's 
house. He was, I believe, a truly religious man. 
De Quincey has ejected some stains upon his char- 
acter, making him appear to be a selfish man. But 
De Quincey, though an eloquent genius, saw his 
equals and superiors in such an intense light of 
feeling, that it served to darken them. The mean- 
ness of some of his remarks upon Wordsworth has 
been proved by Wordsworth's generous and abso- 
lute silence. Wordsworth was a reserved man, 
not always the most amiable, and a supreme egotist. 
But his egotism was of such a harmless and noble 
sort, of so pure and high an ideal, that none could 
be hurt by it. His spirit bent ever reverently 
before God. He has been accused of pantheism ; 
yet a student of his writings will find that the God 
breathing through the natural universe was to him 
no mere suffused essence, but the Father of all, 
never for a moment lost in His own works, but 
who inspires them and uses them as a vast organ- 
ism to play upon and shine through. Of this ever- 
present, ever-speaking God, Wordsworth felt him- 
self called to be a minister. Among these hills in 
whose sight he was born, he lifted his eyes and 
cried, — 

" How beautiful this dome of sky, 
And the vast hills in fluctuation fixed 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 197 

At Thy command how awful ! Shall the soul, 

Human and rational, report of Thee 

Even less than these ? Be mute who will, who can, 

My lips that may forget Thee in the crowd, 

Cannot forget Thee here where Thou hast built, 

For thine own glory in the wilderness ! 

Me didst Thou constitute a priest of Thine." 

The God of Nature whom he joyfully recognized, 
was no beautiful impersonality of the transcendent- 
alism, but a being whom he could worship, and 
with whom he could walk in " amity sublime." 
The prayer at the end of the " Excursion " is warm 
with religious feeling. " The serious song " ends 
in the serener hopes and light of heaven. As we 
love to quote from him whose words are as melo- 
dious as the swellings of a wind-harp, we shall do 
so abundantly. 

Wordsworth was too great a man not to accept 
the inestimable truth of the Christian faith, and its 
new and living way to the Divine person and per- 
fection. But he was one whose special office it 
was to interpret God as manifested in Nature, the 
second book. He was to show the fine relations 
of Nature to the soul, as a voice speaking to the 
soul of its wants, origin, and aim, even as God 
talked with Adam in the garden. 

" For I have learned 
To look on Nature, not as in the hour 
Of thoughtless youth ; but hearing oftentimes 
The still, sad music of humanity." 

" For the man, 
Who, in this spirit, communes with the forms 
Of Nature ; who, with understanding heart, 



198 OLD ENGLAND. 

Doth know and love such objects as excite 
No morbid passions, no disquietude, 
No vengeance, and no hatred, needs must feel 
So deeply, that, unsatisfied with aught 
Less pure and exquisite, he cannot choose 
But seek for objects of a kindred love 
In fellow-natures and a kindred joy. 
Accordingly, he by degrees perceives 
His feelings of aversion softened down ; 
A holy tenderness pervade his frame. 

" His sanity of reason not impaired, 
Say, rather, all his thoughts now flowing clear, 
From a clear fountain flowing, he looks round 
And seeks for good ; and finds the good he seeks ; 
Until abhorrence and contempt are things 
He only knows by name ; and if he hear 
From other mouths the language which they speak, 
He is compassionate ; and has no thought, 
No feeling, which can overcome his love." 

In his philosophy of Nature he had a deeper view, 
I verily think, than is generally held, — than is even 
so vigorously set forth by our own eloquent Bush 
nell, — which regards Nature as but a mechanical 
effect or result of certain fixed causes ; but Nature 
is a more vital and enduring part of God's work 
than this. It is a more true and intimate manifes- 
tation of God. It is something which will never 
cease to be. This Nature in which we are inframed 
answers to the subjective frame-work of our own 
mind, is necessary to its life, and growth, and edu- 
cation, and will be carried with us in its essence in- 
to another state. We are ourselves a part of this 
Nature. It is something in ourselves, which is the 
root of our being to be restored and built upon. 
And here, in Nature, Wordsworth anchored his 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 199 

moral being ; and he was the great moral poet of the 
age. He found the law of God written in nature, — 
in " the fleshly tablets of the heart." As this is an 
imperishable law, so the nature in which it is en- 
graved is imperishable. And he drew from hence 
the great truth upon which he strikes so sweetly 
and boldly of the moral equality of the race. 

" The primal duties shine aloft — like stars ; 
The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless, 
Are scattered at the feet of man like flowers. 
The generous inclination, the just rule, 
Kind wishes, and good actions, and free thoughts — 
No mystery is here ; no special boon 
For high and not for low ; for proudly graced — 
And not for meek of heai't. The smoke ascends 
To heaven as lightly from the cottage hearth 
As from the haughty palace. He, whose soul 
Ponders this true equality, may walk 
The fields of earth with gratitude and hope." 

This led him to respect man wherever he found 
him, and to study man. His walks among the poor 
of the mountains form in reality the simple theme 
of his greatest poem. He brought forth the great- 
ness and angelic splendors of the human soul in its 
lowliest estate. He was a Christian poet here. 
He was never more interested than when studying 
how to benefit the poor, to educate them, to im- 
prove and invigorate the " Poor Laws," to raise 
humanity. He sought his spring of poetry amid 
the sorrows, joys, and experiences of the most 
humble of his fellow-beings. This also made him 
the indomitable poet of freedom. With what pro- 
found and yet indignant spirit he exclaimed : — 



200 OLD ENGLAND. 

" If, having walked with Nature threescore years, 
And offered, far as frailty would allow, 
My heart a daily sacrifice to Truth, 
I now affirm of Nature and of Truth, 
Whom I have served, that their divinity 
Revolts, offended at the ways of men." 

Here he was pathetic when he had lifted up some 
bruised flower of humanity. The granite rock 
which was in his nature, and generally showed 
itself impenetrably hard, melted at this touch. He 
has been charged with coldness as a poet. He 
may have been reserved and unemotional by tem- 
perament, but there was in him a deep fount of 
tenderness, to which the descent in his own lan- 
guage " was by the steps of thought." How feel- 
ingly he drew the trials of poor Margaret, and how 
exquisitely delicate was his picture of Ellen, whose 

" Fond maternal heart had built a nest 
In blindness all too near the river's edge." 

How he loved childhood ! And he became like 
a little child with Nature. He despised nothing in 
creation. He laughed and sported with the daffo- 
dils. In words as familiar now as any that Shak- 
speare wrote he said : — 

" To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." 

And he did not care whether others felt or be ■ 
lieved this with him or no, as far as his own senti- 
ment was concerned. Here was the old Scawfell 
granite. Others would come around to him by 
and by. So he sang with bold and joyful strain : — 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 201 

" Thou art not beneath the moon 
But a thing ' beneath our shoon ' ; 
Let, as old Magellan did, 
Others roam about the sea; 
Build who will a pyramid ; 
Praise it is enough for me 
If there be but three or four 
Who will love my little flower." 

And why are these crowds thronging to his valley 
and his grave, if they have not come round to him? 
What means the rich subjective element which has 
been infused into English literature, if his pro- 
founder ideas have not begun to prevail ? What 
means the fine analysis of Tennyson, his dwelling 
upon lowly and simple themes, his drawing out of 
a deeper soul from inanimate things, if he had not 
drunk into the spirit of this great master of true 
modern poetry ? Wordsworth was the poet of 
progress, — 

"A man of hope and forward-looking mind 
Even to the last." 

His idea of Nature and creation led to unlimited 
search, and to ever- widening and deepening 
thought, because he discerned 

" God in the human soul, and God in all things." 

Rydal Water is a miniature affair, not more than 
half a mile long, but its mountain guardians of 
Loughrigg Fell and Nab Scar make it lose its 
sense of smallness ; and it is not too small for 
many little gems 

" Of islands that together lie, 
As quietly as spots of sky 
Amongst the evening clouds." 



202 OLD ENGLAND. 

A short way on from Rydal Mere, and strung to it 
by a silver streamlet, is the heart of all the lakes, 
Grasmere. As the road creeping around under Nab 
Scar passes the middle part of the lake, it runs near 
the " Wishing Gate " sung by Wordsworth in 
those tripping verses with such solemn ending. 
Here one looks down upon one of the most lovely 
and softly peaceful scenes on earth, and yet with a 
certain sober grandeur about it quite impossible to 
describe. Why was it named Grasmere ? Be- 
cause it could not have been named any thing else. 
There is a grassy margin around the whole shore 
of the lake, spreading out into dark green mead- 
ows at its upper end where the village stands, 
and climbing up almost ,to the summits of the bold 
cliffs that curl their edges over this vale. Just op- 
posite rise the steep, overhanging heights of Silver 
How, and the eye running along its wall follows it 
up into the shadowy recesses of the lonely glen of 
Easedale. At the head of the lake beyond the vil- 
lage, towers the noble cliff called Helm Crag, not 
unlike a Roman soldier's nodding crest, if that were 
indeed the origin of its name. Back of it are the 
higher mountains that lie around Thirlemere Lake, 
and I do not remember whether one can catch here 
a glimpse of the shoulder of Helvellyn above Seat 
Sandal on the far right. 

The waveless expanse of Grasmere, with its one 
little island, spreads out before one, tranquilly re- 
flecting all this beauty. 

A little further on we came to Town End, and 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 203 

saw the humble roof, somewhat out of the village, 
beneath which Wordsworth made his first home. 
Here he brought his young bride, and gathered 
his soul-friends — Southey, Coleridge, Scott, Lamb, 
Lloyd, Wilson — about him. De Quincey also 
lived here after him. And not far from this his 
first home, the scene of his first works and studies, 
standing at the very head of the lake, is the small, 
square-towered, rude stone church, in the grave- 
yard of which he sleeps. 

Within the church there is a marble bas-relief 
of his farmer-like yet thoughtful face, and a just 
and elaborate inscription placed over the pew 
which he frequently occupied. I will not stop to 
transcribe it. 

" Green is the churchyard, beautiful and green, 
Ridge rising gently by the side of ridge ; 
A heaving surface, almost wholly free 
From interruption of sepulchral stones, 
And mantled o'er with aboriginal turf 
And everlasting flowers. These dalesmen trust 
The lingering gleam of their departing lives 
To oral records and the silent heart." 

Beneath Ms ridge of green, with a simple black 
slate-stone at its head, inscribed simply with the 
name of William Wordsworth, among the dales- 
men and humble people with whom he daily 
walked, sleeps the poet. His loved sister, and his 
only daughter Dora, and her husband the scholar 
Edward Quillinan, are laid by his side. Between 
these mounds and the church is the monument of 
poor Hartley Coleridge, covered with a cross-crown 



204 OLD ENGLAND. 

and thorns, with the inscription — " By thy cross 
and passion, good Lord, deliver us ! " 

A clear little stream sings past the very edge of 
these grassy mounds, and slides into the soft and 
quiet lake which is but a few steps distant. The 
great mountains stand watching around. The 
shadows of the clouds pass silently over the spot. 
The stars shine upon it. 

"As in the eye of Nature he has lived, 
So in the eye of Nature let him die." 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE LAKE COUNTRY (CONTINUED.) 

I stopped awhile at the " Swan " to take my last 
near look of Grasmere, and then went slowly up 
the ascending road to Dunmail Raise, which was a 
favorite walk of Wordsworth's. For some way it 
goes almost in the shadow of Helm Crag, whose 
crest presents odd combinations of rocks, out of 
which any one has as much right as the poet to 
form grotesque images. Of a mass of tall hob- 
nobbing; rocks that stand black and clear against 
the sky, Wordsworth's fancy painted this little Al- 
brecht-Diirer picture : — 

" The Astrologer, sage Sidrophel, 
Where at his desk and book he sits, 
Puzzling on high his curious wits ; 
He whose domain is held in common 
With no one but the Ancient Woman, 
Cowering beside her rifted cell, 
As if intent on magic spell ; 
Dread pair, that spite of wind and weather, 
Still sit upon Helm Crag together." 

And the whole group of rocks and mountains 
around was gathered up in a picture in these 
lines : — 

" The rock like something starting from a sleep, 
Took up the lady's voice and laughed again ; 



-206 OLD ENGLAND. 

That Ancient "Woman seated on Helm Crag 
Was ready with her cavern : Hammer Scar, 
And the tall steep of Silver How sent forth 
A noise of laughter, southern Loughrigg heard, 
And Fairfield answered with a mountain tone : 
Helvellyn far into the clear blue sky 
Carried the lady's voice ; old Skiddaw blew 
His speaking-trumpet ; back out of the clouds 
Of Glaramara southward came the voice ; 
And Kirkstone tossed it from his misty head." 

Further to the south of these hills lies the Ober- 
land Alp region of this whole district, the moun- 
tainous group standing about desolate and savage 
Wast Water, and which is said to be very wild 
and grand. Here are the two Scawfell mountains, 
one of them the highest peak of England. This is 
a granite tract ; the rest of these mountains are 
generally of schistose slate, forming what has been 
compared to a slate dome, rising to its greatest 
height in Skiddaw and Helvellyn, and surrounded 
by a rim of old red sandstone, limestone, and coal, 
the latter being found in great quantities near the 
sea, in the neighborhood of Cockermouth and 
Workington. The summit of the Pass at Dunmail 
Raise is six miles and a half from Ambleside, and 
here a new picture is revealed which may be said 
to belong to the Helvellyn circle. That mountain, 
with its long furrowed southern sweep, predomi- 
nates over the scene, and at this moment veils its 
head in the clouds. At its base sleeps the narrow 
lake of Thirlemere, or Leatheswater, so narrow as 
to be bridged over in one place, — a cold and shad- 
owy sheet of water, overhung at its lower end with 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 207 

perpendicular rocks, especially one called Raven 
Crag. Yet when the sun flashed out again, even 
Thirlemere smiled back like a sister to her big" 
mountain brother as the scowl passed away from 
his forehead. Some two miles on in the descent is 
the miniature chapel of Wytheburn, and from Nag's 
Head Inn on the other side of the road directly at 
the foot of Helvellyn, the ascent of that mountain 
is usually made, though this is a steeper path than 
from the Patterdale side. Looking up here at the 
broad and rugged slope of the mountain, my youth- 
ful reader will not forget the story of young 
Charles Gough, who fell from Striding Edge preci- 
pice, and his faithful little terrier that kept three 
months' watch over his dead body. 

Helvellyn rises gradually from a wide-grasping 
base in great steps or terraces, and is so singularly 
formed and placed, that it is one of the most diffi- 
cult of all the great mountains to be seen in its en- 
tire shape. Being centrally situated, the view 
from its summit is the finest in the region, extend- 
ing on the north to the highlands of Scotland. 
The whole character of the mountain justifies Hart- 
ley Coleridge's epithet of " drear Helvellyn." 

The road to Keswick led past the cloven gate 
of the narrow and romantic Vale of St. John, the 
scene of Scott's " Bridal of Triermain." It runs 
along under Naddle Fell, and near its head towers 
the singular architectural rock, that 

" Seemed some primeval giant's hand 
The castle's massive walls had planned." 



208 OLD ENGLAND. 

From the hill of Castleriggs we gained a fine 
afternoon view of the broad resplendent vale of 
Keswick, with its two lakes and river, the tumult- 
uous sea of the Derwentwater and Buttermere 
mountains on the south side robed in purple shad- 
ows and golden lights, and Skiddaw with its two 
peaks in lone majesty on the north. For large and 
beautiful scenery perhaps this is the finest part of 
the Lake region. At least Southey and Coleridge 
thought so. It is not a solitary inner mountain 
shrine, like Wordsworth's home, where his self-sus- 
tained genius could dwell apart ; but it is a free and 
open spot, at the same time cheerful and grand. 
This is the circle of Skiddaw, a noble mountain 
rising easily out of the plain in gentle undulating 
lines, and yet from the fact that it stands alone, 
and shows its whole bulk, it is a finer mountain 
than Helvellyn, which is larger. 

The afternoon was so beautiful, that although 
the sun was setting, I determined to see the length 
of lovely Derwentwater, and come home by the 
light of the stars. The lake is but half a mile from 
Keswick, by a broad walk that forms the public 
promenade of the town. The opposite mountains 
lying between Derwentwater and Buttermere and 
Crummock Lakes, of which Causey Pike, Greisdale 
Pike, and far-off Wythop Fells, are the highest 
summits, form a broken tumultuous group, a forest 
of mountains, peak beyond peak, and at the mo- 
ment were richly tinted and softened by the sunset 
lights, that grew every moment mistier and dream- 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 209 

ier and deeper in their purples and violets. It 
does not require the highest mountains like the 
Alp? to awaken feelings of pure pleasure and sub- 
limity All mountain regions have more or less of 
this power. Our American hills will make their 
own poets ; and have already served to refresh and 
purify thousands of minds. God doubtless meant 
them for this as well as for lower uses. Coming 
out of such a " valley of the shadow of death " as 
that of the Aar into the sweet vales of Imhof and 
Meyringen, one gets glimpses of truth that no other 
Nature can teach. The soul covets great emotions. 
These the mountains give. They brace the mind 
to grand purposes. And such delicate atmospheric 
phenomena, sucli a blue in the sky, such marvelous 
tints upon the rocks, such ethereal purity if one 
goes into the heart of the glaciers, — these are next 
to impressions of things spiritual. 

But I am getting away from a fine English lake, 
if i£ be not a Swiss one. I called it "lovely" 
Derwentwater ; it deserves a stronger epithet than 
that ; for although the mountains about it are not 
high, yet they are so steep, so broken, forming such 
shadowy bays, and piling up so boldly toward the 
eastern Borrowdale end, that the scenery really 
merits the title of grand. Each lake has its own 
character. Taking away the associations, I was 
more impressed with the mingled grandeur and 
loveliness of Derwentwater than with the beauty 
of any of the other lakes. 

I set forth on the placid water under the guid- 

14 



210 OLD ENGLAND. 

ance of a veteran oarsman named William Pear- 
son, whose tongue ran like that of an old man, 
and sensibly too. Talking confidentially of some 
Americans he had taken out but a short time be- 
fore on the lake, he said he never saw people with 
so much " bounce." Good ! but we come fairly 
by it, friend Pearson of the white locks ! 

This western end of the lake appears mountain- 
locked, and one does not see here the whole extent 
of the water. We rowed directly over to Yicar's 
Isle, a wooded island of six acres, containing a 
gentleman's residence hidden among the trees. 
Passing this we struck out into the middle of the 
lake, going by Lord's Island, and St. Herbert's 
Isle, where was once a little chapel dedicated to 
Saints Herbert and Cuthbert, who had such love 
for each other, that 

" Though here the hermit numbered his last day, 
Far from St. Cuthbert his beloved friend, 
Those holy men both died in the same hour." 

The margin of the lake is luxuriantly wooded, 
and on the northern shore there is a strip of 
meadow-land. Rich vegetation clothes the steep 
slopes of the mountains. How still the water over 
which we glided ! Now and then a silver-sided 
trout would leap above the surface as if to catch 
the last lingering light. We pushed in among the 
long weeds off the Inn of Lodore when the twilight 
was almost gone, and walked fast up to the mouth 
of the ravine where the " Falls of Lodore " ought 
to be. Owing to the excessively dry season they 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 211 

were rather a tinkling trumpery affair, and did not 
come up to the roaring and pouring part of the 
ode. But a very respectable precipice rose back 
of the gorge, and the rocks were heaped around 
in wild confusion. After taking a look at the end 
of the lake, (not very distant, for we went near- 
ly its whole length and made out some of the 
Borrowdale mountains that close around it,) we 
turned our faces toward Keswick. The row back 
was by the starlight. A faint tinge of light lin- 
gered long upon the western slope of Skiddaw in 
front of us, which here appeared like a rounding 
range or crown of mountains, rather than a single 
mountain. Over the highest peak of Skiddaw glit- 
tered one large bright star ! The mountain shadows 
lay dark on the edges of the glassy mirror. But in 
the centre there was a silver expanse, and through 
this the boat left a path like a string of pearls, and 
even the old boatman, who looked upon the lake as 
his farm and fish-pond, was subdued by the calm- 
ness of the scene. On landing he showed us a 
large battered boat that he said Mr. Southey used 
to use for picnics on St. Herbert's Island. He also 
had pointed out to us a commanding rock, or 
promontory, which Southey always showed to his 
friends and visitors as a place where he should like 
to build a house. 

The home comes before the grave. " Greta 
Hall," standing aside from the principal street of 
Keswick on a grassy mound, at the foot of which 
runs the " carolling " Greta, and having on the 



212 OLD ENGLAND. 

other side nothing between it and Skiddaw, is now 
the property of an English bachelor of literary and 
scientific tastes, who, it is said, holds the memory 
of its former occupant in enthusiastic veneration. 
While the place is in fine order, it has been pre- 
served almost in the exact condition in which 
Southey left it. It is a plain tall white house, with 
vines running over the lower part of it. It has an 
air of comfort without being at all fine. There is 
a sloping grass-plot in front bordered with thick 
shrubs and trees, and the gardener pointed out to 
us the spot where Southey watched for his daughter 
coming home through the hawthorn walk. One 
gets a fine view here across the plain of the moun- 
tains on the other side of Derwentwater. The 
gardener told me (these were his very words) that 
"Mr. Southey when he walked always looked up 
into the element." He said, " Poor man, before 
he died, he was better pleased with rolling marbles 
than any thing else ; and he could not tell one book 
from another, though he handled them through 
custom." I went into the room which was South- 
ey's library, that once consisted of more than 
7000 volumes ; it is now occupied by a scientific 
collection. I also saw the room where the poet 
died, a small apartment looking out upon some 
gloomy fir-trees ; and was then shown Coleridge's 
part of the house. His wife and Mrs. Southey it is 
well known were sisters. I afterward went down 
to the bank of the Greta, a babbling and cheerful 
stream, and looked up at Skiddaw, which begins to 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 213 

rise from this point in a huge mass directly above. 
The poet had made a true selection of a home. Yet 
Southey drew more from his library within, than 
from Greta or Skiddaw without. He did not, like 
Wordsworth, repose on the bosom of Nature, and 
want nothing else for nourishment. He depended 
upon his books ; and even his poetry was but a 
kind of glow around the edges of his vast historical 
lore. But what poetry he did write was noble and 
pure. Would that his pure unadulterated English 
were more imitated by the writers of the day. He 
did not falsify his art, nor strain after a clap-trap 
effect. He was the scholar of that great trium- 
virate of which Wordsworth was the poet, and 
Coleridge the philosopher. I cannot leave this spot 
without saying a word about Coleridge. This was 
the home of some of his most creative days. It is 
the small fashion now among a certain class to dis- 
parage Coleridge, to lessen his philosophical name, 
and to follow De Quincey in his charges. These 
charges are simply absurd. An American scholar 
of unquestioned integrity told me that in a con- 
versation not many years since with Schelling, the 
philosopher referred with approbation to those very 
passages in the " Literaria Biographia " that De 
Quincey said were plagiarized, and evidently with 
no idea that they were taken from him. He spoke 
of Coleridge as the greatest English philosophical 
mind. Coleridge had no need to take from Schell- 
ing or any one else. They had both, it is true, 
drunk from the same fount of Kantian philosophy ; 



214 OLD ENGLAND. 

and their samenesses of expression probably arose in 
the following way : Coleridge's literary habits were 
careless ; in his youth when in Germany he had 
made notes from Schelling's lectures, laid them 
aside and forgotten them ; when renewing the same 
studies he referred to his German notes, probably 
supposed they were his own, and freely used them ; 
but he seems to have had a suspicion that they 
were not all his own, and he therefore says in 
so many words, that what things were not his he 
would wish to lay no claim to and take no credit 
for, or something to that effect. It is a shame to 
charge so great and generous a soul as Coleridge 
with the petty sin of pilfering. As to his opium- 
eating, brought on by using opium under the advice 
of a physician, it has been distinctly denied by his 
own family that he died in this habit. He had 
become, after an affecting conflict, a penitent and 
reformed man. His last days were those of a 
humble, trusting Christian. His mind was taken 
up with spiritual contemplations. His end was 
beautifully peaceful and childlike. It will yet be 
acknowledged how much England and Christianity 
owe Coleridge. He taught the reasonableness of 
Christianity. He showed that it met with the 
highest reason in man. He opposed the devas- 
tating current of the sensational school with a 
deeper current. He was almost the only English- 
man who sought for or apprehended the true and 
universal, in philosophy as in faith ; and whatever 
England possesses of philosophy which is more pro- 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 215 

found than the utilitarian system now upheld by an 
ability and persistency worthy of a better cause, is 
due to Coleridge. The Reids, Stewarts, and Ham- 
iltons, could not compare with him in originality and 
depth of insight, if their mechanical skill in system- 
making was greater. 

Let the young men of America who wish to try 
their minds in such high and difficult studies, in- 
stead of going to Comte, Cousin, and the French 
school, or even to the profounder school of Ger- 
many, begin to study Coleridge, who, with the ex- 
ception of Lord Bacon, was the deepest and richest 
English philosophical mind. He will aid them to 
believe, and lead them to a truer and deeper faith 
instead of shipwrecking their faith. Why in truth 
do we need to go outside of this little England of 
our fathers for any thing, when it comprehends 
such minds as Lord Bacon, Shakspeare, Milton, 
and Coleridge ! 

I made a pilgrimage to the burial-place of Cole- 
ridge at Highgate, so long renowned as a rural 
suburb of London, a kind of northern Richmond 
Hill. In front of Dr. Gilman's house is a row of 
elm-trees under which Coleridge used to walk, 
" and think of eternity." The old man who showed 
me about the place said : " Mr. Coleridge used to 
walk as if he was always studyin' and explainin' to 
himself, which gave him a kind o' curous look." 
The poet was actually buried beneath the old 
church which is now removed. The vault is in- 
scribed with the initials S. T. C. and the date 



216 OLD ENGLAND. 

1834. His monument, however, erected by Dr. 
Gilman, is upon the inside wall of the new church, 
a fine edifice standing at some little distance from 
the site of the old, and from whose back windows 
is perhaps the most magnificent prospect of London 
that can be found, with St. Paul's in the centre. 
The inscription I give in full as the testimony of 
one who knew him, and who is an unchallenged 
witness : — 

" Sacred to the memory of 

SAMUEL TAYLOE COLERIDGE, 

Poet, Philosopher, Theologian. 

This truly great and good man resided for 

the last nineteen years of his life 

in this hamlet : 

He quitted ' the body of this death ' 

July 25th, 1834, 

in the sixty-second year of his age. 

Of his profound learning and discursive genius 

his literary works are an imperishable record. 

To his private worth, 

his social and Christian virtues, 

JAMES AND ANN GILMAN, 

the friends with whom he lived . 

during the above period, dedicate this tablet. 

Under the pressure of a long 

and most painful disease, 

his disposition was unalterably sweet and angelic. 

He was an ever-enduring, ever-loving friend : 

the gentlest and kindest teacher: 

the most engaging home-companion." 

We add the well-known epitaph written by Cole- 
ridge himself a month or two before his death : — 

" Stop, Christian passer-by ! Stop, child of God ! 
And read with gentle heart. Beneath this sod 
A poet lies, or that which once seemed he : 
Oh lift in thought a prayer for S. T. C, 



THE LAKE COUNTRY. 217 

That he, who many a year with toil of breath 

Found death in life, may here rind life in death ! 

Mercy for praise — to be forgiven for fame 

He asked, and hoped, through Christ. Do thou the same." 

We now come back to Greta Hall. Walking 
clown a side road, past what was once the real front 
or lawn of Southey's house, and crossing the bridge 
over the Greta, I came to Crosthwaite Church. It 
is more of an edifice than the church of Grasmere, 
and yet it has something of the same rude sim- 
plicity. These words of Wordsworth, which might 
also describe many an English rural church, would 
give a true idea of it : — 

" Not framed to nice proportions was the pile, 
But large and massy, for duration built; 
With pillars crowded and the roof upheld 
By naked rafters intricately crossed, 
Like leafless under-boughs in some thick grove, 
All withered by the depth of shade above. 
Admonitory texts inscribed the walls, 
Each in its ornamental scroll inclosed; 
Each also crowned with winged heads — a pair 
Of rudely painted cherubim The floor 
Of nave and aisle in unpretending guise 
Was occupied by oaken benches ranged 
In seemly rows; the chancel only showed 
Some inoffensive. marks of earthly state 
And vain distinction. A capacious pew 
Of sculptured oak stood here, with drapery lined; 
And marble monuments were here displayed 
Upon the walls ; and on the floor beneath 
Sepulchral stones appeared with emblems graven, 
And foot-worn epitaphs, and some with small 
And shining effigies of brass inlaid." 

Set this on a solitary spot, with the circle of 
mountains around, and you have the place where 
the scholar and poet Southey has his last rest. 



218 OLD ENGLAND. 

Within the church there is a monument to him, 
with a white marble reclining figure, finely done, 
though there is an uneasy posture of the head. 
Wordsworth, who knew him best, wrote the lines 
inscribed upon the monument : — 

" Ye vales and hills whose beauties hither drew 
The Poet's steps, and fixed them here, on you 
His eyes have closed ! And ye loved books, no more 
Shall Southey feed upon your precious lore; 
To works that ne'er shall forfeit their renown, 
Adding immortal labors of his own; 
Whether he traced historic truth with zeal, 
For the State's guidance, the Church's weal, 
Or Fancy, disciplined by studious art, 
Informed his pen, or Wisdom of the heart, 
Or Judgment, sanctioned in the patriot's mind, 
By reverence for the rights of all mankind ; 
Wide were his aims, yet in no human breast 
Could private feelings find a holier nest. 
His Joys, his Griefs, have vanished like a cloud 
From Skiddaw's top; but he to Heaven was vowed 
Through a long life and pure ; and Christian Faith 
Calmed in his soul the fear of Change and Death." 

In the churchyard, with a slab of black slate- 
stone at its head, like that at Wordsworth's grave, 
is the grave of Southey, with this inscription : 
" Here lies the body of Robert Southey, LL. D., 
Poet Laureate. Born August 12, 1774 ; Died 
March 21, 1843. For forty years a resident in this 
parish. Also of Edith, his wife. Born May 20, 
1774 ; Died Nov. 16, 1837." 

It was no fancy at all, but as I stood there a 
slight cloud of mist was just detaching itself from 
the top of Skiddaw, as in the figure of Words- 
worth. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 

We have now come across England to Berwick 
on the river Tweed, and shall go down to London 
on the eastern side, — though an Englishman 
would call coming up from London to Scotland 
" going down." 

Berwick-upon-Tweed is a venerable sea-stained 
town, with a long and massive stone pier looking 
out on the German Ocean. It is surrounded by a 
wall that has stood the brunt of many a hard con- 
test between two stubborn and still unmixed na- 
tions in the Border wars. This is the famous 
Teviot-dale and Chevy-Chace region. 

We here enter Northumberland, (Northumbrian 
land,) the scene of innumerable legends, in every 
vale that runs inland, and upon every sandy hil- 
lock that stands on the sea-shore ; the home of the 
Percy, whose name starts armed men from the 
earth. 

The railway from Berwick to Alnwick, thirty 
miles, is in sight of the sea nearly all the way. It 
passes by Belford, and by Bamborough Castle, 
near which places, off the coast, are the Farn 
Islands, where Grace Darling did those achieve- 



220 OLD ENGLAND. 

ments that make bearded men silent when they 
think of them. 

This was the same Bamborough of the old " Bat- 
tle of Otterbourne " ballad : — 

" Yf thou hast hanged all Bambarowe shyre, 
Thou hast done me grete envye ; 
For the trespasse thou hast me done, 
The tane of us schall dye." 

Alnwick, a little to the west of the North British 
Railway, and reached by a short junction line of 
three miles, is a clean and stately town of seven or 
eight thousand inhabitants. It has the peculiar air 
of a " family town," not precisely the dependency, 
but the historical background, the natural u belong- 
ing " of an illustrious race. It is overshadowed by 
one mighty name from which it derives its own 
light and importance. The flashily painted omni- 
bus from the Railway station rattles through the 
narrow and sullen old " Bondgate," said to have 
been built by " Hotspur " himself. 

Alnwick Castle did not disappoint me, though I 
had always thought of it as the " Ilium " of Eng- 
land's historic story. It is a vast accumulation of 
masonry grouped around tall central towers. It 
has sixteen of these towers, and its whole mass 
spreads over five acres. Round and angular bas- 
tions of different heights give it a noble irregularity 
of outline, but it is bare of that beautiful " shawl- 
ing " of ivy and green that covers the old bones 
'of other English castles. It seems to say : " I am 
strong and young still. I want no covering for my 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 221 

age. I can defend myself against all storms." It 
is stone, stone, stone, everywhere, with not a green 
thing within and without. At least this is my re- 
membrance of it. Over the barbican, as you enter, 
stands an armed figure in stone, in the act of hurl- 
ing a rock on the head of any who dare approach ; 
and around the battlements are the effigies of other 
warriors in animated fighting; attitudes. Such a 
stout, world-defying old pile is it, that a man, if he 
has never done so before or after, feels himself a 
hero while under the shadow of its lofty walls. 

I was only permitted to see its three outer courts, 
not the interior apartments. Some visitor a few 
years since wrote in a disparaging strain of the 
Duke's building operations at Alnwick, and since 
then strangers have not been freely admitted. 
This was a disappointment, but I gained a good 
impression nevertheless of the stronghold of the 
Percies, and of the " great Northumberland." 
Going through the low-arched gateway, that 
seemed to echo still with the ring of steel-clad 
men and horses, one comes upon a noble view of 
the main body of the castle, rising in rectangular 
towers partly modern and partly antique. Here is 
a large outer court, where a small army might as- 
semble. In the second court, you see the immense 
preparations for the modern kitchen department 
not yet finished. You are shown the place in the 
walls called the " Bloody Gap " through which the 
Scots forced their way under King Malcolm, who 
was slain at a short distance from the wall. 



222 OLD ENGLAND. 

In the smaller inner court, surrounded by dark, 
high, gloomy towers, the stern heart of this 
strength, near the Saxon gate, is the prison where 
William the Lion was confined. Here the porter 
cracked a harmless and venerable joke. " King 
Malcolm," said he, " was killed at the Bloody Gap 
a tryin' to ruin the Duke o' Northoomberlan' ; and 
this her same Malcolm's gran'daughter, mind you, 
sir, was glad to get a Duke o' Northoomberlan' for 
a hoosband." How the worthy seneschal of the 
Percies giggled and shook at this mouldy bit of 
family lore in the gloom of that dusky dungeon ! 
Architectural works of great magnitude are still 
going on within and without the castle, and the 
courtyards are encumbered with blocks of stone. 

The whole enormous mass of buildings hangs 
over the bright little stream of the Alne, beyond 
which the view is broken and wooded. Half a mile 
up the river amid the shadows of aged trees, is the 
romantic Warkworth Hermitage, a chapel and two 
chambers hewn in the side of a cliff: — 

" There scooped within the solid rock 
Three sacred vaults he shows." 

The first part of the ride from Alnwick to New- 
castle, (sixty-three and a half miles,) passes through 
the beautiful region of the Wansbeck River and 
the Blyth. The deep gorges, the clear streams 
dancing to the sea, and the green undulating hills, 
with here and there a clump of red-roofed farm- 
houses, with their prim hay-ricks, formed another 
singular contrast to the barren and smutchy coal 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 223 

region of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. This city may be 
compared to a big pitch-pot — the black Tyne an- 
swering for the simmering liquid decoction, and the 
ships, houses, carts, and men, for the bubbles. The 
railway stretches directly over the river and city to 
the height of 120 feet. Dimly seen through the 
clouds of smoky vapor, rises the grim tower of 
Robert, son of William the Conqueror, with the 
crimson flag of England floating from its battle- 
ments. The bridges, houses, and sails of the ship- 
ping are also black. Every thing is hung in vest- 
ments of sable, though it is reported by those who 
have been able to see them that there are fine 
streets and magnificent buildings, and all the signs 
of flourishing opulence in this dark-browed capital 
of coal. 

On the way to Durham, which is fourteen and a 
half miles from Newcastle, we passed by " Wash- 
ington," a place with three chimneys, and the re- 
mains of an old broken steam-boiler. 

Durham is perhaps the most picturesquely situ- 
ated town in England. It is placed upon a rocky 
hill that rises abruptly from the banks of the Wear, 
its sides covered with thick foliage, and on its high- 
est summit stands the Cathedral, with its three 
square towers. The old monks built like emper- 
ors. They crowned every city, and wrote upon 
the very heavens, as it were, the insignia of their 
heaven-delegated power. The house or castle of 
the king had to take a lower place. When Rich- 
ard Coeur de Lion left for the Holy Land, he put 



224 OLD ENGLAND. 

the charge of his realm in the hands of the Bishop 
of Durham, where it was probably before. As I 
entered the Cathedral, one of the week-day morn- 
ing services was progressing. According to my 
impression, as I have before hinted, the finest 
church music in Europe is to be heard in the Eng- 
lish Cathedral service. The music at St. Peter's, 
or in Catholic churches, does not equal it for purity, 
fervor, and the exquisite beauty of the chorals of 
boys' voices. Whether this constant repetition of 
the Prayer-book, week in and week out, before a 
few ladies, children, and amateurs of music, bene- 
fits the common people, and raises the standard of 
religion and benevolence, is another question. The 
manner in which the prayers are raced through, 
and the processions hurried in and out, and the 
vestments slipped on and off, shows that it becomes 
wearisome to the most devout. 

The pillars of the nave are massive, and orna- 
mented with circular and zigzag lines, after the 
most fantastic description of the Norman architect- 
ure ; and the church itself is Norman. It dates 
from the end of the 11th century. Its great fault 
is the lowness of the nave ; but it has some singu- 
lar architectural peculiarities and beauties. Among 
these is what is called the " Galilee," on the west 
end overhanging the river. It is a structure that 
mingles the Norman and Early English styles, with 
ponderous chevron mouldings and arches resting 
upon slender pillars. It came very near being 
swept away by that classic barbarian bigot of the 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HA WORTH. 225 

last century, Mr. Wyatt, who wanted to make a 
carriage-drive around this end of the church. Here 
is the monument of the " venerable Bede," in 
which all of his bones that were not scattered as 
relics through the world were deposited- Manu- 
scripts in his handwriting are to be seen in the li- 
brary. It is told of him in the old chronicles, that 
in his later days, when he was blind, he was led by 
the fraud of his guide to a great heap of stones, and 
was told that a large assembly of men and women 
were awaiting him to hear him preach the word of 
God. He, thinking it to be true, commenced a 
homily, and when he came to the end, the stones 
by divine power, like a great multitude of people, 
said u Amen," or, as the Latin version is, " Deo 
gracias." It were better to make the stones cry out 
by preaching like living men, than to petrify living 
men into stones ! Let then the preacher have the 
venerable Bede in mind, and resolve, by God's 
help, to make men's stony hearts say " Amen " to 
his words. 

But the peculiar genius of this cathedral was St. 
Cuthbert, whose shrine did an immense " sheep 
shearing" business in the early centuries ; especially 
as the Saint was reported to lie in an incorruptible 
state, " entire, flexible, and succulent." In 1827 
the coffin of St. Cuthbert was opened and the tricks 
of the monks exposed. Balls were found in the 
eyes, gold wire for the hair, and swathings over the 
bones. 

On the outside of the northern door is a great 

15 



226 OLD ENGLAND. 

grotesque brass head with staring hollow eyes and 
a ring in its mouth, and it is said that in the olden 
time, whenever a criminal fleeing from justice 
could seize upon this ring he was safe. The floor 
beneath the western tower was sanctuary ground. 
This is the account given in a work on the antiqui- 
ties of the church. " The culprit upon knocking 
at the ring affixed to the north door was admitted 
without delay, and after confessing his crime, with 
every minute circumstance connected with it, the 
whole of which was committed to writing in the 
presence of witnesses, a bell on the Galilee tower 
ringing all the while to give notice to the town that 
some one had taken refuge in the church, there 
was put upon him a black gown with a yellow cross 
upon its left shoulder, as the badge of St. Cuthbert, 
whose girth or peace he had claimed. When 
thirty-seven days had elapsed, if no pardon could 
be obtained, the malefactor, after certain ceremo- 
nies before the shrine, solemnly abjured his native 
land forever, and was straightway, by the agency 
of the intervening parish constables, conveyed to 
the coast, bearing in his hand a white wooden cross, 
and w T as sent out of the kingdom by the first ship 
which sailed after his arrival." There was a time 
when rough free England was absolutely ruled by 
the Church. The Church's temporal as well as 
spiritual power was above that of king or civil 
judge, even as claimed in the bull of Pope Urban ; 
and this lasted till Henry VIII. demolished it, and 
proclaimed himself head of the English Church, 
the one being about as just a claim as the other. 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HA WORTH. 227 

The Bishopric of Durham is still worth some- 
thing. The recent Bishop is reported to have left 
a property of 11,000,000. 

Durham Castle, now turned into a peaceful theo- 
logical seminary, contains nothing remarkable. 

Yorkshire is the Empire State of England. In 
size, agricultural richness, manufactures, popula- 
tion, noble estates, rural beauty, and historical an- 
tiquities, it is the queen of English counties. It is 
more than six hundred square miles larger than 
Lincolnshire and Devonshire combined, which are 
the next largest counties. One section of it alone, 
West Riding, contains about a million and a half 
of people, one twelfth of the population of Eng- 
land. Yorkshiremen are tall and well-fed. They 
love horses, drive keen bargains, and are more like 
" Sam Slick's " Yankees, even in their dialect, than 
these are to their originals. If the ample kitchen 
fire-place and the old hearty English manners in 
hall and cottage remain anywhere unchanged in 
this " fast " age, they may be found in Yorkshire. 

From Durham to York it is sixty-seven miles. 
The number of gentlemen's residences and noble- 
men's parks in this part of England is incredible. 
One naturally asks where is there any land to be 
obtained by smaller proprietors and farmers ? One 
cannot wonder that the word " locate," as " to 
locate a lot of land," should be considered an 
Americanism, there being no such unappropriated 
bit of earth left in England. But the wealth of 
such great landowners flows over their land, and 



228 OLD ENGLAND. 

makes it indescribably green, smooth, and beautiful. 
How different now the scene from that described 
by an old historian, giving an account of the effects 
of William the Conqueror's rage against the rebel- 
lious, or rather, as was really the case, patriotic 
Saxons. " He wasted the land between York and 
Durham, so that for three score miles there was left 
in manner no habitation for the people, by reason 
whereof it laid waste and desert for nine or ten 
yeares. The goodlie cities, with the towers and 
steeples set up on a statelie height, and reaching as 
it were into the air ; the beautiful fields and past- 
ures watered with the course of sweet and pleasant 
rivers ; if a stranger should then have beheld, and 
also knowne what they were before, he would have 
lamented." No wonder the stern warrior gasped 
out on his death-bed : " Laden with many and 
grievous sins, O Christ, I tremble ; and being 
ready to be taken by Thy will into the terrible 
presence of God, I am ignorant what I should do, 
for I have been brought up in feats of arms even 
from a child. I am greatly polluted with the effect 
of much blood. A royal diadem that never any 
of my predecessors did bear I have gotten ; and 
although manly greediness on my triumph doth 
rejoice, yet inwardly a careful fear pricketh and 
biteth me when I consider that in all these cruel 
rashness hath raged." 

York, where one Roman Emperor was born and 
another buried, has sunk from an imperial city next 
to London, to a place of third or fourth rate impor- 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HA WORTH. 229 

tance. It mixes drugs and blows glass bubbles 
where it once ruled a kingdom. On its gates the 
great " king-maker's " head was set, crowned with 
a paper cap by the fierce Queen Margaret. But 
the youngest reader need not be told that York 
Minster is the grandest building in Great Britain, 
and among the finest in the world. From the top 
of its central tower one can see thirty miles. Its 
west front is a most splendid instance of the Deco- 
rated style, and as " La Sainte Chapelle " is the 
" rose " of France, so its little chapter-house is the 
" rose " of England. Its seven great windows, 
and especially what are called " The Five Sisters 
of York " with painted glass of the 13th century, 
glow as if studded with gems. Charlotte Bronte 
often looked on these jewelled windows, and walked 
under these arches, and heard this great organ. 

From York I went to the famous English " Spaw," 
consisting of two villages about a mile apart, called 
"High" and " Low Harrowgate." They are situ- 
ated in the middle of the county, on the highest 
table-land in England, and are resorted to by 
dyspeptics and artists. Harrowgate is the " Avon 
Springs " of England. The sulphurous waters are 
of considerable strength and efficacy, and these 
combined with the pure air often effect cures in 
cases well-nigh desperate. I stopped at the " Gran- 
by Hotel " in High Harrowgate, termed in the 
guide-book " the truly aristocratic hotel of the 
Spa." It stands on the edge of a broad breezy 
common, over which young ladies in flats are con- 



230 OLD ENGLAND. 

tinually walking or impelling reluctant donkeys. 
Old ladies in satins, and ancient gentlemen with 
the florid manners and costume of the era of 
George IV., play everlasting games of whist in the 
crimson-curtained parlor. 

The walk between the two villages is through 
quiet fields, with now and then an' old-fashioned 
" stile." In the vicinity of Harrowgate are some 
of the most picturesque ruins in England, and 
around it like a rim stretch the Craven and Ham- 
bleton Hills. But the coal-colored skies were 
gloomy and showery, though in a scientific book 
it was stated that " the amount of precipitation is 
less than that of the neighborhood." The old 
English word for " glory " was " clerenesse," and 
we wonder not that the clear shining of the sun in 
this region of perpetual mist should be thought 
glorious. 

While at Harrowgate I made an excursion to 
" Fountains Abbey," fourteen miles distant by the 
Ripon road. How one speeds along over the smooth 
turnpikes in a stiff two-wheeled English wagon ! 
We hardly yet know the luxury of such riding in 
America, excepting on a few of our best roads out 
of the large cities. Twenty or thirty miles are 
something of a distance to drive, but it is reeled 
off so easily, that neither the driver nor the horses 
seem to think any thing of it. They are fast drivers 
in England because both the horses and roads are 
admirable. At Ripon I strolled into the old church, 
and saw the lugubrious sight of the charnel-house 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 231 

literally crammed with human bones, piled up with 
the nicety and geometric regularity of a ware- 
house. 

It was a pleasant sight to stand on the old stone 
bridge over the bright Ure, and watch the river 
rippling underneath as clear as amber, as clear as 
when St. Wilfred drank it. 

Three miles from Ripon is Studley Royal, be- 
longing to Earl de Grey, in whose grounds are the 
ruins of Fountains Abbey. It is difficult to say 
which is the finest, Fountains, Bolton, or Tintern 
Abbey ; perhaps the last ; but there is nothing in 
the world more lovely than one of these English 
Abbeys, fallen to decay yet still tall, strong, and 
majestic in what remains ; draped with vines and 
ivy, silent and unused, and standing in the midst 
of the most luxuriant Nature. 

Fountains Abbey is indeed " a tale of the times 
of old." The lofty beautiful arches, the extent and 
solidity of the whole gray pile, and the perfect re- 
pose of the narrow vale, completely shut in by 
rocks and trees, and hushed to listen to the mur- 
murs of its own little brook, which seems to whis- 
per, — 

" Men may come and men may go, 
But I flow on forever," — 

this just meets that mood of mind (certainly not 
the highest or best), in which, wounded and 
wearied by the world, one in old times and some- 
times in these days, would gladly turn Contem- 
plator, instead of Actor in worldly scenes. 



232 OLD ENGLAND. 

In this dell, Robin Hood had his famous encoun- 
ter with the " curtail fryer," in which he appears 
to have had the worst of it. 

" From ten o'clock that very day, 
Till four i' th' afternoon ; 
Then Robin Hood came to his knees 
Of the fryer to beg a boone; " 

and it ended in this compromise : — 

" If thou wilt forsake fair Fountaine's dale 
And Fountaine's Abbey free, 
Every Sunday throwout the yeare 
A noble shall be thy fee." 

Standing a little to the west of the abbey,, is the 
oldest yew-tree in England, with the exception 
perhaps of the one in Iffley churchyard. It is 
called the "Abbot's Yew." It was known to be 
aged when the abbey was built, and still so tough 
and vigorous is it, that two younger trees have 
forced themselves up through the parent trunk. 
Sombre and stirless it stands, not revealing what it 
has seen. 

From Harrowgate I drove over the moors to 
44 Bolton Priory." It is hardly fair to have two 
such abbeys come close together, but it cannot be 
helped ; still as I have resisted the temptation of a 
description in the one case, so I will in the other. 

Bolton Priory is now the possession of the Duke 
of Devonshire. May he have capacity to enjoy all 
he possesses ! To own such a spot as Bolton Pri- 
ory were enough for one man. I do not envy its 
owner, but one almost thinks when he sees it, that 
he should never desire to leave it for a day. Here is 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 233 

every thing one could wish, and trout and " gray - 
ling " in the river. The vale in which the abbey 
stands is itself a noble one. The wide, bright 
meadows, the clear rushing Wharfe, and the tall 
cliffs that hang over the river, and grow narrower 
and more broken at the upper end of the valley to- 
ward Barden Fell, make it the central spot in Eng- 
land for sweet native loveliness. The first instance 
of Turner's mountain drawing, it is said, was from 
these shores of the Wharfe, which was his favorite 
Yorkshire river that he never could " revisit with- 
out tears, or speak of without a faltering voice." 
The only tender spot in his rude heart, the only 
spring which appeared to open into something rarer 
and nobler in him, was this exquisite perception, 
this pure and delicate love of Beauty, which sought 
its object not in the strange or grand, but in the 
quiet haunt and inmost shrine of Nature. 

Keighly (pronounced " Keatley ") has been 
chiefly made known to us from its proximity to 
Haworth, Charlotte Bronte's home. When did 
we ever hear or think of it before ? Yet it is one 
of those important and swarming manufacturing 
places that make the power and wealth of Eng- 
land ; and, as I arrived on pay-day afternoon, the 
streets were thronged with thousands of factory- 
people, bearing the hard and independent stamp of 
West Riding weavers, described so vigorously in 
44 Shirley." In the dull and up-hill ride of four 
miles to Haworth, shut in most of the way by high 
stone walls, instead of the usual green hedges, I 



234 OLD ENGLAND. 

could not but think of those two feeble sisters, 
struggling along afoot over this dreary road, in the 
thunder-storm, on their way to Keighly to take the 
London train, for the purpose of proving to their 
publisher their actual and separate identity. We 
passed several great stone mills that might have 
been very well used for fortresses. 

Haworth was pointed out with its gray tower, 
near the summit of a very high hill, and at its back 
swept away north the rolling, dismal moorlands, 
without the sign of a human habitation. A month 
later, and these moors would be gorgeous with 
heather-blossoms. 

After passing a few straggling houses, we began 
to ascend that long, steep, paved street of Haworth, 
now become so well known. What a straining, 
scrambling pull of it ! At the top was the " Black 
Bull Inn." Its little parlor was well enough, but 
its sleeping apartments were frowsy and dirty, for 
probably few people ' overnight ' there, as the Ger- 
mans say. 

Just at the left of the inn, within a step or so, 
through a tall iron gate, was the populous cemetery 
of the church. 

The church itself is a plain stone building, less 
interesting, architecturally, than English village 
churches usually are. The tower is evidently of 
very ancient date, with a modern body pinned upon 
it. All was hard, weather-worn stone, with noth- 
ing green or smiling ; there was not a tuft of grass 
about the churchyard. 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 235 

I could not help glancing at the " Parsonage," 
looking over the edge of the tabled graveyard ; 
but I hastened into the church, and was seated in 
the Squire's pew near the pulpit, hung with faded 
green baize. 

For an English village choir's artistic perform- 
ances, I refer my readers to the u Sketch-Book." 

Mr. Nicholls preached from John v. 1. He is a 
dark-complexioned man, rather thin, with black 
hair and beard. It was a short, practical sermon, 
and the tones of his voice, especially in the service, 
were grave and pleasant, and, as I conceived, with 
a touch of sadness. The plaintive " litany " seemed 
never more appropriate. It was a gusty day of 
rain and shine, but its general complexion was mel- 
ancholy. 

The old pews within were so dull and brown, the 
old tombs outside were so still and sad, and the 
roar and dashing of the storm at times was so dis- 
mal, that the sins, conflicts, and sorrows of life 
would have been the sermon preached to one's 
heart, had the preacher charmed never so sweetly. 

I saw the pew, and the corner of it, where Char- 
lotte used to sit ; and the new white marble tablet 
on the wall, erected to her memory, and that of her 
mother, four sisters, and brother. Its Scriptural 
motto was from 1 Cor. xv. 56, 57. The victory 
was soon gained after all, for the authoress of 
" Jane Eyre " and u Shirley " was only thirty- 
nine when she died. I was also shown the register 
of her marriage, and her autograph in the church 



236 OLD ENGLAND. 

records. And here she was married, and her 
stern old father was not even present to give her 
away. 

Without intending or seeking it, I was invited, 
as a stranger, to call upon Mr. Bronte, for a few 
moments during the intermission. 

I went through a high-walled yard at the back 
of the house, around to the front, through a small 
flower-garden, (rather run to waste now,) and was 
shown by " Martha " into Mr. Bronte's study. 

I do not think it would be violating good taste to 
speak of an interview so simple, and that had noth- 
ing confidential in its character. 

Mr. Bronte met me with real kindness of man- 
ner, but with something of the stateliness of the 
old school. His hair, worn short, was white as 
driven snow ; his ample cambric cravat completely 
covered his chin ; and his black dress was of the 
most scrupulous neatness. He has been called 
handsome, but that he never could have been. He 
has strong, rugged, even harsh features, with a high, 
wrinkled forehead, and swarthy complexion ; and 
his eyes are partially closed, for he is almost blind. 
He said he was induced to invite me to his house, 
though he saw very little company, because he 
learned I was an American, and he thought much 
of America. 

Our conversation was chiefly upon religious top- 
ics, and he wished to be informed about the great 
spiritual movements which from time to time pass 
over America. He thought that revivals in 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 237 

England and Ireland were accompanied b^y too 
much animal excitement ; yet he believed in 
their reality. He spoke of Roman Catholicism, 
and said that he had seen enough of it, as he was 
an Irishman. He thought we ought to guard 
against its machinations on the other side of the 
water. Roman Catholics could not be consistent 
Republicans ; and we must not trust too carelessly 
to the principle that Truth would prevail in an 
open field. The Catholics made much of that, and 
took advantage of it. He spoke of education in 
England — that it was all the fashion just now ; 
but I could not help thinking that the conservative, 
granite-minded old " Helstone " looked upon a 
great deal of it as sentimental and superficial. He 
struck me as being naturally a very social man, 
with a mind fond of discussion, and feeding eagerly 
on new ideas, in spite of his reserve. My call was 
necessarily quite a short one. I then went into 
the opposite parlor, where his daughters used to sit 
and write. There was Charlotte's portrait, with 
those large dark eyes, square impending brow, and 
sad, unsmiling mouth. Branwell Bronte's medal- 
lion likeness hung opposite ; and Thackeray's por- 
trait, " looking past her," as she said, was on the 
front wall. Her books still lay on the table. There 
was a Bible of Emily's, and a much-worn copy of 
Mrs. Gaskell's " Mary Barton," presented by the 
authoress to Mrs. Nicholls. This room had rather 
a pleasant look ; but its furnishing was simple to 
severity, and its only ornament was a little bunch 



238 OLD ENGLAND. 

of broom-grass on the table. Martha then showed 
me into the kitchen for a moment. This had been 
Tabby's kingdom. Every thing was exquisitely 
neat, and the copper pans shone like gold. It was 
a snug, warm, crooning place ; and it was not diffi- 
cult to see the picture, on a dark winter eve, when 
the storms howled over the moor and rattled 
against the windows, of those bright-fancied chil- 
dren crouching together around the fire, telling their 
strange stories, and living in a world created by 
themselves. Here Emily Bronte studied German, 
with her book propped up before her, while she 
kneaded dough. Now all are gone ; and the old 
father, shutting up many things in his own impen- 
etrable mind, was still living on alone, thinking 
more perhaps of meeting his children again in a 
sinless and sorrowless world, than of all their fame 
in this. 

In the afternoon I heard Mr. Bronte preach 
from Job iii. 17 : u There the wicked cease from 
troubling ; and there the weary be at rest." It 
was the simple extemporaneous talk of an aged 
pastor to his people, spoken without effort, in short, 
easy sentences, — and was drawn, it appeared to 
me, right out of that old graveyard, among whose 
stones his feet had walked, and his imagination had 
lived so long. In parts it was pathetic, especially 
where he alluded to the loss of children. He 
branched off upon the sorrows, convulsions, and 
troubles then in the world, and he seemed to long 
for wings like a dove to fly away from this change- 



TWEEDMOUTH TO HAWORTH. 239 

ful scene, and be at rest. The old church clock, 
as if echoing the venerable preacher's remarks, had 
written upon it, " Time how short — eternity how 
long ! " 

On the whole, my Haworth visit was a serious 
and sobering one. I thought of what Charlotte 
Bronte said, that " it always made her unhappy to 
go away from Haworth, for it took her so long to 
become happy after she got home." Yet that 
stone house a century old, those bleak moors, that 
very melancholy crowded graveyard, may have 
done something to make Charlotte Bronte what 
she was. They fenced her in, and made her in- 
ventive. Her fiery Irish imagination was concen- 
trated here into a vital energetic current, that did 
not waste itself in endless poetic mazy streams, but 
cut for itself a deep, practical, and creative channel. 
As a pearl-oyster will, after a time, coat a gravel- 
stone introduced into it with its own rich and pure 
enamel, so the few rough and homely objects that 
her mind was familiar with, became clad with the 
lustrous and glorious beauty of her own thought 
and imagination. The less she saw, the more ac- 
curately she drew, and the more profoundly she 
analyzed. Her bodily eye grew microscopic, but 
her spiritual vision was enlarged, and saw into the 
elements of things, and the hidden springs of ac- 
tion. Hence a shy, secluded little woman de- 
scribes Nature as if she had always been accus- 
tomed to live in the midst of the most lovely and 
opulent scenery, and moves our mind with some- 



240 OLD ENGLAND. 

thing of the mighty power of Shakspeare, when 
she lays bare the abysses and spiritual forces of 
moral character. Even in her most vivid and 
realistic writings there is this intense subjective- 
ness. 

The best criticism ever made upon her novels, it 
seems to me, was this — that her characters did not 
converse like human beings, but that their conver- 
sation was in fact their thoughts; it was thinking 
aloud. 

I afterward saw Madame Heger's school in 
Brussels, where Charlotte and her sister resided for 
a time. Even that seemed to be a dull, shut-in 
spot, as it were down in a pit. Intellectually 
speaking, she was a vine always to be kept pruned 
close by the husbandman, that she might bring 
forth more fruit. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 

Twelve miles to the south of Doncaster, on the 
great Northern line of railway, and just at the 
junction of Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, and Lin- 
colnshire, in the county of Nottingham, but border- 
ing upon the fenny districts of Lincolnshire, whose 
monotonous scenery reminds one of Holland, lies 
the village of Scrooby. Surely it is of more in- 
terest to us than all the Pictish forts and Roman 
walls that the " Laird of Monkbarns " ever dreamed 
of. I was dropped out of the rail carriage, which 
hardly stopped, upon a wide plain at a miniature 
station-house, with some suspicions of a church and 
small village across the flat rushy fields in the dis- 
tance. This was indeed the humble village (though 
now beginning to be better known) which I had 
been searching for ; and which nobody of whom I 
inquired in Doncaster, or on the line of the railway, 
seemed to know any thing about, or even that such 
a place existed. I made its discovery by the help 
of a good map. The station-master said that he 
came to Scrooby in 1851, and then it numbered 
three hundred inhabitants ; and since that time 
there had been but twelve deaths. 

16 



242 OLD ENGLAND. 

My search for the manor-house where Brewster 
and Bradford established the first church of the 
Pilgrims, was, for a time, entirely fruitless. I in- 
quired of a genuine " Hodge " working in the 
fields ; but his round red face showed no glimmer 
of light on a matter so far removed from beans 
and barley. I next encountered a good Wesleyan 
minister, trudging his morning circuit of pastoral 
visitation, but could gain nothing from him, though 
a chatty, communicative man. At the venerable 
stone church of Scrooby, very rude and plain in 
architecture, but by no means devoid of picturesque- 
ness, I was equally unsuccessful. The verger of 
the church, who is generally the learned man of the 
village, was absent ; and his daughter knew nothing 
outside the church and churchyard. 

I strolled along the grassy country road that ran 
through the place till I met a white-haired old 
countryman, who proved to be the most intelligent 
soul in the neighborhood. He put his cane to his 
chin, shut and opened his eyes, and at last told me 
in broad Yorkshire, that he thought the place I was 
looking for must be what they called " the bishop's 
house," where Squire Dickinson lived. Set at last 
upon the right track, I walked across two swampy 
meadows that bordered the Idle River, — perti- 
nently named — till I came to a solitary farm- 
house with a red-tiled roof. Some five or six 
slender poplar-trees stood at the back of it, and a 
ditch of water at one end, where there had been 
evidently an ancient moat — "a moated grange." 



HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 243 

It was a desolate spot, and was rendered more so 
just then by the coming up of a thunder-storm, 
whose u avant courier," the wind, made the slender 
poplars and osiers bend and twist. Squire John 
Dickinson, the present inhabitant of the house, 
which is owned by Richard Monckton Milnes, the 
poet, gave me a hearty farmer's welcome. I think 
he said there had been one other American there 
before ; at any rate he had an inkling that he was 
squatted on soil of some peculiar interest to Amer- 
icans. He introduced me to his wife and daughters, 
healthy and rosy-cheeked English women, and made 
me sit down to a hospitable luncheon. He enter- 
tained me with a discourse upon the great amount 
of hard work to be done in farming among these 
bogs, and wished he had never undertaken it, but 
had gone to America or Australia. The house he 
said was rickety enough, but he contrived to make 
it do. It was, he thought, principally made of 
what was once a part of the stable of the Manor 
House. The palace itself has now entirely dis- 
appeared ; " but," said my host, " dig anywhere 
around here and you will find the ruins of the 
old palace." Dickinson said that he himself was 
reared in Austerfield, a few miles off in Yorkshire ; 
and that a branch of the Bradford family still lived 
there. After luncheon I was shown Cardinal 
Wolsey's mulberry-tree, or what remained of it ; 
and in one of the barns, some elaborately carved 
wood-work and ornamental beams, covered with 
dirt and cobwebs, were pointed out, which undoubt- 
edly belonged to the archiepiscopal palace. 



244 OLD ENGLAND. 

This was all that remained of the house where 
Elder Brewster once lived, and gathered his hum- 
ble friends about him, in a simple form of worship. 
Bradford, in his " Life of Brewster," says : " They 
ordinarily met at his house on the Lord's day, which 
was a manor of the Bishop's, and with great love 
he entertained them when they came, making pro- 
vision for them to his great charge, and continued 
so to do whilst they could stay in England." And 
Leland, in 1541, says : " In the meane townlet of 
Scrooby I marked two things, the parish church not 
big but very well builded, the second was a great 
manor place, standing with a moat and longing to 
the Archbishop of York ; builded in two courts, 
whereof the first is very ample, and all builded of 
timber saving the front of the house, that is of 
brick, to the which ascenditur per gradus lapideos." 
This manor was assigned to the Archbishop of 
York in the " Doomsday Book." Cardinal Wolsey, 
when he held that office, passed some time at this 
palace. While he lived there, Henry VIII. slept 
a night in the house. It came into Archbishop 
Sandys's hands in 1576. He gave it by lease to his 
son, Samuel Sandys, under whom Brewster held 
the manor. Brewster, as is now well known, was 
the Post-Superintendent of Scrooby, an important 
position in those days, lying as the village did, and 
does now, upon the great northern line of travel 
from London to Yorkshire, Northumberland, and 
Scotland. 

A Cambridge scholar, and clerk of Secretary 



HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 245 

Davison, Brewster had seen much of courts and 
mingled in public scenes. While engaged upon an 
important embassy to Holland, he had undoubtedly 
often met and conversed with that remarkable and 
far-sighted man, William the Silent. Bradford, a 
man of good family in the neighboring town of 
Austerfield, became interested in Brewster's relig- 
ious views when but eighteen years of age, and at 
once joined Brewster's little company of independ- 
ent worshipers, who were composed chiefly of Lin- 
colnshire farmers and ditchers ; and here on every 
Lord's day they met to worship until they left in a 
body for Holland. As the judicial books of the 
neighborhood still show, many members of this 
congregation refused to obey, at the cost of fine 
and imprisonment, the oppressive ecclesiastical laws 
of Elizabeth and James I., and of a somewhat later 
time. They were evidently no fanatics. The 
three simple points upon which Brewster and his 
co-religionists founded their right of separation from 
the Established Church at that time were these : 

1. The determination not to support and attend 
upon many prescribed ecclesiastical forms, not per- 
haps wicked in themselves, but inwoven with ordi- 
nances and opinions that they esteemed Popish. 

2. The claim to the right of individual interpreta- 
tion of the Scriptures. 3. The assertion of the 
right to exclude immoral persons from their church 
communion. These points of difference compelled 
them to be separatists, not only driving them to a 
separation from the Church of England, but from 



246 OLD ENGLAND. 

their native soil, and finally compelled them to 
become " strangers and pilgrims " on a totally new 
and foreign shore. The calm and enlightened 
character of Brewster himself forbids us supposing 
that he would have undertaken any thing unrea- 
sonable, wild, or visionary. He and his coadjutors 
were not disorderly persons, and did not go law- 
lessly to work. They constituted themselves into 
a- church, " to walk in all his ways made known 
or to be made known unto them, according to 
their best endeavors, whatever it should cost them." 
These last were no empty words, spoken as they 
were in times of persecution, when the government 
of the land, stimulated by the State Church, was 
sternly determined to crush out the life of dissent 
from the kingdom. The church thus established 
was the model of all our New England churches to 
this day, and was organized it is supposed about 
the year 1602. In 1606 Brewster was chosen an 
elder, and Clifton the pastor. John Robinson of 
Newark, Norwich County, then makes his appear- 
ance as teacher and preacher of this humble church. 
This little church removed with much difficulty, 
loss, and peril, during the pastorate of Richard 
Clifton, as one religious body to Holland, though 
in two divisions. They went first to Amster- 
dam : and afterward a portion drew off with John 
Robinson and settled in Leyden ; and it was 
this portion of the Scrooby and Brewster, Leyden 
and Robinson church, which formed the integral 
part of the one hundred souls who returned to 



HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 247 

England in the Speedwell, and who finally em- 
barked in the Mayflower from Plymouth. The 
remainder of the people, and many other English 
refugees for conscience' sake, crossed over soon 
after by other vessels to America. But these were, 
by eminence, the "Pilgrim Fathers;" the separa- 
tists from the non-conformists ; the purest siftings 
of the wheat ; the " Puritans of the Puritans." 
They were, it is true, mostly unknown Lincoln- 
shire ditchers, and plain Nottinghamshire farmers, 
with now and then a yeoman, and a man of family 
and education. They were, however, sound, hon- 
est, thoughtful Englishmen. They were diligent 
readers of the Bible, and were really superior in 
their moral convictions, and their spiritual eleva- 
tion, to the rest of Englishmen at that time. As 
Governor Bradford wrote of them, " but they knew 
they were pilgrims, and looked not so much on 
those things, but lift up their eyes to the heavens, 
their dearest country, and quieted their spirits." 
They formed neither the highest nor the lowest 
class in the land, but that class of independent agri- 
culturists, of " free socage tenants," who were the 
root of English freedom, and the English civil con- 
stitution. They had besides a small but pure leaven 
of consecrated learning in their body. Who, in- 
deed, would ask but for one such capacious mind 
as that of John Robinson, whom God had made 
great, wise, and prophetic, to be the founder of a 
free and mighty people ! " He was," says a con- 
temporary, speaking of the Puritans, "the most 



248 OLD ENGLAND. 

learned, polished, and modest spirit, that ever that 
sect enjoyed." The great words which he spake at 
the time of parting with his flock at Delft Haven 
are an inestimable legacy to us for all time : " 4 We 
are now ere long to part asunder, and the Lord 
knoweth whether ever he should live to see our 
faces again. But whether the Lord had appointed 
it or not, he charged us before God and his blessed 
angels, to follow him no further than he followed 
Christ : and if God should reveal any thing to us 
by any other instrument of his, to be as ready to 
receive it as ever we were to receive any truth of 
his ministry ; for he was very confident the Lord 
had more light and truth yet to break out of his 
holy Word. He took occasion also to bewail the 
state and condition of the reformed churches, who 
were come to a period in religion, and would go no 
further than the instruments of their reformation. 
As for example the Lutherans, they could not be 
drawn to go beyond what Luther saw ; for what- 
ever part of God's will he had further imparted to 
Calvin, they will rather die than embrace it. And 
so also, saith he, you see the Calvinists, they stick 
where he left them, a misery much to be lamented ; 
for though they were precious shining lights in 
their times, yet God had not revealed his whole 
will to them ; and were they now willing, saith he, 
they would be as ready to embrace further light as 
that they had received.' ' While thus a man of 
far-sighted penetration and progress, he was firm 
upon the great truths of our Christian faith. He 



HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 249 

had the spirit of Christ, and united courage with 
mildness. His " New Essays on Things Moral and 
Divine " contain passages which, for smoothness and 
vigor of style, compare well with the writings of 
Hooker, or Hall, or any of his contemporaries. 
" Faith," he says, " as a welcome passenger must 
be well carried and convoyed through a sea of 
temptations, in a vessel of good conscience, that it 
suffer not shipwreck ; directed by the chart of 
God's Word and promises rightly understood, that 
it run not a wrong course ; and having ever in 
readiness the anchor of hope against a stress ; and 
continually gathering into the outspread sails of a 
heart enlarged by prayer and meditation, the sweet 
and prosperous gusts of God's Holy Spirit to drive 
it to the desired haven." In the same essay he 
says : " Lastly, touching love ; as it is the affection 
of union, so it makes after a sort the loving and 
loved, one ; such being the force thereof, as that he 
that loveth suffereth a kind of conversion into that 
which he loveth, and by frequent meditation of it 
uniteth it with his understanding and affection. O 
how happy is the man, who by the sweet feeling of 
the love of God shed abroad in his heart, is there- 
by, as by the most strong cords of Heaven, drawn 
with all the heart to love God who hath loved him, 
and so becomes one with him, and rests upon him 
for all good." These are passages taken at ran- 
dom. It is strange that his writings are not more 
read by American Christians. 

It is said of Bradford, a worthy disciple of Rob- 



250 OLD ENGLAND. 

inson in largeness of soul and mental culture, that 
he mastered the Latin and Greek and studied 
Hebrew, because " he would see with his own eyes 
the ancient oracles of God in their native beauty." 
Brewster himself was a man of no mean acquire- 
ments. His library, which was the principal part 
of the estate he left, consisted of two hundred and 
seventy-five volumes, sixty-four of them being on 
the learned languages. Other Cambridge scholars 
followed them shortly after, among whom was that 
wise and gentle spirit, John Cotton, the founder or 
father of Boston. 

Such were the men who were gathered together 
in that small despised religious communion, and 
who came to the New World as a united Christ- 
ian church, impelled by a purely spiritual motive, 
without any admixture — among the original " Pil- 
grim Fathers " — of the commercial idea ; to plant 
almost unconsciously, and as the natural results of 
their religious views, the principles of a free repub- 
lican state. Let us never doubt that the pure im- 
pulse which bore them to America, will preserve 
their principles through all time to come. 

Puritanism always goes, as Macaulay has splen- 
didly demonstrated, before the establishment of a 
just, free, and Christian government ; it must ever 
be, " first pure, then peaceable." 

I do not believe that Puritanism comprehends 
the whole truth ; for Puritanism is itself partial, 
though as far as it goes it is sound and true. But 
a world-church can never be founded on the prin- 



HOME OF THE PILGRIMS. 251 

ciple of separation, but only of unity ; and it must 
have more than purity, it must have faith, hope, 
and charity. Puritanism makes a good beginning, 
— the only good beginning ; yet it must rise to a 
higher, and larger, and diviner idea of truth, before 
it shall become the Church or the State universal. 
But to look at this lonely and decayed manor- 
house, standing in the midst of these flat and deso- 
late marshes, and at this most obscure village of 
the land, this Nazareth of England, slumbering in 
rustic ignorance and stupid apathy, and to think 
of what has come out of this place, of what vast 
influences and activities have issued from this quiet 
and almost listless scene, one has strange feelings. 
The storied " Alba Longa," from which Rome 
sprang, is an interesting spot, but the newly dis- 
covered spiritual birthplace of America may excite 
deeper emotions. 



CHAPTER XV. 

LINCOLN TO ELY. 

I have said that Lincolnshire was Dutch in its 
scenery ; the resemblance is greatly heightened 
by the numberless windmills, some of them old, 
ragged, and picturesque. Broad canals shimmer- 
ing in the red light of sunset, straight as a bee-line, 
and stretching as far as the eye could reach, cut 
through this flat, fat, fenny soil, which has been 
nearly all reclaimed and brought to a high state 
of kitchen-garden cultivation, though at vast cost. 
When will the " Pontine Marshes " be as thorough- 
ly drained, and fit for something else than the habi- 
tation of wild hogs and buffaloes ? This whole Fen 
district is computed to comprehend the immense 
tract of four hundred thousand acres. 

Lincoln rises abruptly from the plain. Its sum- 
mit is crowned by the Cathedral, which presides 
over a vast extent of flat country ; and so com- 
manding is its position and its height, that it can 
be seen, it is said, from Buxton hills in Derby- 
shire. 

It is a tough walk in warm weather up " Steep- 
hill Street," but the Cathedral amply repays the 
effort. It is certainly in grandeur next to York 



LINCOLN TO ELY. 253 

Minster, of all the English Cathedrals, and as a 
whole impressed me more. There is more of 
rugged strength and majesty in its front, while the 
east end is incomparable for its elegance and flow- 
ing grace. Its central tower rises to the height 
of two hundred and sixty-eight feet. In ascending 
the tower, I arrived at the bell-room just as great 
" Tom of Lincoln " was striking. The still air 
was in an instant racked with a mighty uproar, and 
the solid tower trembled under every humming 
thunder-stroke. The view from the summit is one 
of the most peculiar in England ; the ancient city 
clustering on the slopes of the hill, and then a 
level plain not strewn very thickly with towns and 
villages, but rather like a grassy Hungarian steppe 
stretching far and wide to the hills on one side and 
the sea on the other. The Cathedral is built in the 
form of a double cross ; its best parts belong to the 
most elaborate and mature period of the " Early 
English " or " Pointed " style. Within and with- 
out it is rich in carving of the boldest character. 
One can see in under the leaves. The " Presby- 
tery " or " Lady Chapel " is full of this exquisite 
carved work, and is sometimes called the " Angel 
Choir," from the figures of thirty angels in the 
spandrels of the triforium arches, carved as if they 
were flying on high, and playing upon every kind 
of temple instrument, such as the harp, trumpet, 
cittern, cymbal. The two great marigold windows 
in the principal transept, each twenty-two feet in 
diameter, and filled with deep-colored painted glass, 



254 OLD ENGLAND. 

give a rich tone to this central portion of the build- 
ing, supported upon its four heavy piers or clus- 
tered pillars. The fault of the edifice is the com- 
mon fault of the lowness of the nave, which gives 
too weak and steep a pitch to the roof. But it is 
absurd to criticize these Gothic structures ; they 
have no rules like mountains, and take such forms 
as they please ; they delight in the strangest con- 
trasts and most violent irregularities ; their unity 
is not in their uniformity of structure, but in their 
heaven-ascending aim, to which all tends. The 
" Chapter House " of the Cathedral is an entirely 
distinct appendage upon the northern side, in the 
form of a decagon, and is flanked by bold flying 
buttresses, as if tied to the ground by them like a 
wide-spreading tent. Its interior, supported by a 
single-reeded pillar of Purbeck marble, is not un- 
like a great military tent. 

I was shut up by accident for half an hour in 
this " Chapter House," so that I had more time to 
study it. It abounds in those grotesque carvings 
that are so suggestive but mysterious. The small 
queer faces on the capitals of pillars and termina- 
tions of mouldings, look down upon you as if they 
were alive : sometimes it is the face of a monk and 
sometimes of a nun, and the monk does not always 
look pious but roguish ; now it is a beautiful coun- 
tenance with wonderful serenity and purity of ex- 
pression, then it is a face in torment with the 
mouth horribly stretched, and the parched tongue 
lolling out ; here is a winged angel, and there a 



LINCOLN TO ELY. 255 

squat demon ; animal heads, beaks, snouts, claws, 
images of the sensual passions and bestialities of 
the mind, mix with the symbols of purer and 
higher things. 

In going from Lincoln to Nottingham, thirty-five 
miles, we passed Newark, in whose castle King 
John died, worn out by his vices and military mis- 
fortunes. 

The scenery of the Trent valley was very pretty 
and peaceful, with the stacks of grain standing in 
the fields, and the cattle feeding in great numbers 
on the smooth meadows, or cooling themselves in 
the stream. 

I asked a farmer who sat by me, without mean- 
ing any disrespect, — « What little stream is that ? " 
"Wha, that's the Trent!" he answered with a 
stiff expression, as much as to say, " Your ques- 
tion, sir, is an insult to one of the most respectable 
rivers in the kingdom." 

The eastern side of England, which is not as a 
general thing much visited by American travelers, 
is hardly less rich and beautiful than the western 
side, and is equally strewn with historical monu- 
ments. The climate, however, is said to be some- 
what less genial. It is nearer the coasts of Hol- 
land, and was once more open to the spiritual 
winds and influences of the great German Ref- 
ormation ; and this last idea increases upon us as 
we approach Cambridge. 

At Nottingham we are within fifteen miles of 
Derby, where I was a few weeks since. This is 



256 OLD ENGLAND. 

the town and county of Robin Hood, Henry Kirke 
White, and Lord Byron, — an odd juxtaposition of 
names ; yet there can be little doubt that the fact 
of Robin Hood's still living and popular ballads 
being known and sung in Nottingham, had its in- 
fluence to make Henry Kirke White a poet, and he 
was not without his influence upon the mind of 
young Byron. 

The house where Henry Kirke White was born 
is in what is called the " Old Shambles." The 
lower part of it is now used as a butcher's shop, as 
it was, I believe, originally. There is a staring 
daub of a picture upon it nearly as large as the 
house, representing the youthful poet sitting among 
shrubs and trees. The room where he was born 
forms part of another larger room, which is now 
used as a dining-room for a small tavern. It is a 
low-walled and decayed apartment, paved with 
crumbling cement. What, I was told, was Henry 
Kirke White's study, is a closet three feet by five ! 
Two bits of red and yellow glass have been stuck 
in the little window to give it a shade more of im- 
portance. His inspiration was not caught here, 
but out under the trees of Clifton, and along the 
peaceful banks of the Trent. I walked through 
the Nottingham market-place, truly a magnificent 
square, up to the deserted terrace of the old castle, 
upon which stand the empty, cracked, and tottering 
walls of a palace that was burned in a Chartist 
riot. On this rock many kings have lived ; great 
events have revolved around it ; it was the strong- 



LINCOLN TO ELY. 257 

hold of the Danes, when they held the northeastern 
counties of England, and here their gloomy " raven 
banner " once waved. Nottinghamshire and Lan- 
cashire mark indeed the circle of the main Danish 
conquests in England, and they are full of Danish 
names. Our old friend, " Peveril of the Peak," 
had a castle also on this eminence ; Richard Coeur 
de Lion, after having crushed his brother's rebel- 
lion, held his first council here ; Owen Glendower 
was shut up here ; Richard III. made it his favor- 
ite den; Charles I. proclaimed the civil war by 
raising a standard on a turret of this castle, and 
here he was afterward confined as a prisoner. It 
is truly a lordly rock, and commands a wide and 
delightful prospect. "The silver Trent" flows 
through the valley at its foot, and just on the 
other side of the stream lies Henry Kirke White's 
favorite haunt, the beautiful village of Wilford, 
with lovely Clifton Grove. The view from this 
point extends even to the hills of Derbyshire. 
Nottingham stands on the edge of the ancient 
" Merry Sherwood " Forest, and the royal marks 
going back as far as King John's reign, are some- 
times found upon the trees of this region when 
they are felled. There are some parts of the an- 
cient forest still left intact, whose sylvan beauty, 
solitude, and majesty, it is said, would find no better 
description at this day, than the one which is given 
in the opening chapter of Ivanhoe. On my way 
back I fell in with an agreeable and chatty old 
gentleman who invited me into his summer-house, 
17 



258 OLD ENGLAND. 

and showed me a chamber cut in the rock, where 
the ancient archers concealed themselves and their 
fires in the winter time. He said he had seen 
Lord Byron, who used to visit Nottingham when 
his " Hours of Idleness " was being published in 
that town. He well remembered seeing him riding 
on a gray horse, dressed in a scarlet hunting-coat 
and jockey cap. 

Nottingham is a large busy city, numbering per- 
haps 130,000 inhabitants. It has advanced lately 
with great rapidity, and has immense factories of 
cotton-yarn, stockings, and lace. The first cotton- 
mill in the world was erected here by Sir Richard 
Arkwright. 

I took the cars for Hucknall Torkard, seven 
miles to the northwest of Nottingham. It is a dull 
dirty village ; and here, in one of the poorest and ap- 
parently most forlorn of all English rural churches, 
Lord Byron is buried, out of sight, it would appear, 
and out of mind, of all England. 

The church is a small stone building, with the 
plaster peeling off the tower ; the porch over the 
door is made of rough and unpainted beams. The 
interior is also mean, with a row of rude pillars in 
the middle, altogether reminding me of Haworth 
Church. At the upper end a small white marble 
tablet bears the well-known inscription : — 

" In the vault beneath, 

Where many of his ancestors and his mother are buried, 

Lie the remains of 

GEORGE GORDON NOEL BYRON, 

Lord Baron of Rochdale 



LINCOLN TO ELY. 259 

In the County of Lancaster, 

The author of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. 

He was born in London on the 

22d January, 1788 ; 

He died at Missolonghi, in Modern Greece, on the 

19th of April, 1824, 

Engaged in the glorious attempt to restore that 

Country to her ancient freedom and renown." 

The family shield, with its motto, " Crede Byron," 
is engraved on the tablet. 

Here the poet's mother and daughter are also 
buried, but with nothing erected to their memory, 
if we except two worn and dirty pasteboard sheets, 
which some stranger had caused to be made and 
hung up there. The pen-and-ink words commem- 
orating Byron's daughter are these : — 

" The Eight Honorable 

AUGUSTA ADA, 

wife of 

William, Earl of Lovelace, 

and only daughter of 

George Gordon Noel, 

Lord Byron. 

Born 10 Dec, 1815 ; 

Died 27 Nov., 1852." 

The inscription to the poet's mother declares her 
to have been a lineal descendant of James I. of 
Scotland. 

On a yellow faded marble scroll, in a recess 
formed by the end window, is an ancient monu- 
ment to others of the Byron family, some of them 
being illustrious, so the inscription runs, for " great 
piety and goodness." 

A simple but bitter remark of the poet to one 



260 \ OLD ENGLAND. 

of his friends, has always seemed to me a key of 
many of his deepest faults of character. He said, 
— "I never was governed when I was young." 
There was certainly much of latent sweetness in 
his nature. Reading his " Childe Harold " by the 
mountain grave of that pure spirit, Alexander 
Vinet, at Clarens, and looking down on the placid 
Lake of Geneva, where the poet invoked that 

" Undying Love who here ascends a throne, 
To which the steps are mountains," — 

I felt that his verse was no desecration of that 
sublime scenery. I do not, however, blame Eng- 
land for being slow to readopt the memory of an 
outcast son, who dishonored the two great lights 
of her glory, her Virtue and her Home. u But," 
as Richter says, " have not giants in all nations 
warred against God ? " 

Newstead Abbey is about three miles from 
Hucknall Church, and is too familiar a pilgrimage 
for me to tread over. I had some difficulty in 
getting to it, being compelled to walk a goodly 
distance in a hot sun, and then through the assist- 
ance of a little lame boy who was the only person 
I could interest in my behalf, was enabled to hear 
of some sort of wheeled conveyance, and to have 
the promise of being taken up in an express-wagon 
" in aboot arf an oor." This was indeed good 
news, for in my tired and heated state even a 
donkey-cart would have been hailed with joy. 

The half hour had grown into an hour or more, 
when a good fellow driving an ample " spring-cart " 



LINCOLN TO ELY. . 261 

wheeled up. I tumbled into its capacious depths, 
and as we jogged on I thought of Mrs. Poyser's 
ambitious speech, — " If you can catch Adam Bede 
for a husband, Hetty, you'll ride in your own 
spring-cart some day." I had attained that sublime 
position, and was in high spirits, when we met 
the Lord of ISTewstead Abbey, the late Colonel 
Wildman, driving out his family, with whom my 
coachman exchanged bows as if they were old ac- 
quaintances. 

Let us now pay a brief visit to the Abbey of 
Peterborough, built originally in the fens where 
English piety in ancient times found its last refuge. 
Its inclosure of garden, graveyard, cloisters, and 
schools, is a most venerable spot. The nave of the 
Cathedral is Norman Gothic, with three tiers of 
bow-headed arches forming the sides and the clere- 
story. The length is four hundred and seventy- 
nine feet. The masses of shadow, and the bold 
mingling of different kinds of arches and of their 
intersecting lines, make the interior effect singu- 
larly impressive. Its wealth of sepulchral brasses 
is still remarkable, though greatly despoiled in the 
civil wars. These brasses, once called " latteen," 
laid in Purbeck marble, were really the first stereo- 
types. The exterior needs a lofty tower and spire, 
but the defect is almost compensated by the beauty 
of the west front, with its three deep-recessed 
pointed doors, like a great organ front. The south 
gateway of the court leading into the Bishop's Pal- 
ace is a gem of the "Early English" style; its 



262 OLD ENGLAND. 

graceful groined roof and its turrets adorned with 
sculptures of saints and kings, struck me as being a 
sort of ecclesiastical or Gothic " arch of Titus," as 
indeed well corresponding to the old Roman arch 
in size and beauty. 

Peterborough was the native place of Dr. Paley. 
Though a city, it is one without a mayor or corpo- 
ration. 

I was attracted around by the way of Ely, to see 
the Cathedral there, instead of taking the Hunting- 
don route more directly to Cambridge. This was 
quite a loss, for Oliver Cromwell was born in Hunt- 
ingdon. Hinchinbroke House, the property of his 
family, now belongs to the Earl of Sandwich. 

But Ely Cathedral was not to be lost. It is 
frozen history as well as " frozen music." I value 
these old structures because such wealth of English 
history is embodied in them ; their human inter- 
est after all is greater than their artistic. Ely is 
said to be derived from " willow," or a kind of 
willow or ozier island, upon which the abbey and 
town were built in the midst of the marshes. 
Among these impenetrable marshes Hereward the 
Saxon retreated ; and here, too, we have that bit 
of genuine antique poetry which from its simplicity 
must have described a true scene ; and we catch a 
glimpse of that pleasing and soothing picture amid 
those rude and bloody days, of King Canute and 
his knights resting for a moment upon their toiling 
oars to hear the vesper-song of the monks : — 



LINCOLN" TO ELY. 263 

" Merrily sung the monks within Ely 
When Canute the king rowed thereby ; 
1 Eow me, knights, the shore along, 
And listen we to these monks' song.' " 

The foundation of the Cathedral was laid in 1083, 
and it was finished in 1534. In printed lists of its 
bishops, as in those of other English cathedral 
churches, I have noticed that they are given in 
their chronological succession, right on, the bishops 
of the Reformed Church being linked upon the 
Roman Catholic bishops. The bishopric of Ely 
was partially carved out of the bishopric of Lincoln, 
and comprises Cambridge in its jurisdiction. It 
has therefore had all the riches, influence, taste 
and learning of the University to bear upon the 
restoration of its noble old Cathedral ; and of all 
the old churches of England this one exhibits indi- 
cations of the greatest modern care and thought 
bestowed upon it. It glows with new stained-glass 
windows, splendid marbles, exquisite sculptures, and 
bronze-work. Its western tower, 266 feet in 
height, turreted spires, central octagon tower, fly- 
ing buttresses, unequalled length of 517 feet, and 
its vast irregular bulk soaring above the insignifi- 
cant little town at its foot, make it a most com- 
manding object seen from the flat plain. 

What is called the octagon, which has taken the 
place of the central tower that had fallen, is quite 
an original feature of the church. Eight arches 
rising from eight ponderous piers form a windowed 
tower, or lantern, which lets in a flood of light 
upon the otherwise gloomy interior. Above the 



264 OLD ENGLAND. 

key-stone of each arch is the carved figure of a 
saint. The new brasses of the choir are wonder- 
fully elaborate. The bronze scroll and vine-work 
of the gates and lamps, for grace and oriental luxu- 
riance of fancy, for their arabesque and flower de- 
signs, might fitly have belonged to King Solomon's 
Temple of old. The modern wood- work of the 
choir compares also well with the ancient wood- 
work carving. Gold stars on azure ground, and 
all vivid coloring and gilding, are freely used. The 
new " Reredos," or altar-screen, is one marvelous 
crystallization of sculptures. The ancient Purbeck 
marble pillars have been scraped and re-polished, 
and form a fine contrast to the white marbles on 
which they are set. 

If indeed one wishes to see what modern enthu- 
siasm, art, and lavish wealth can do for the restora- 
tion and adorning of one of these old temples, he 
must go to Ely Cathedral. But he will hear the 
worthy verger, as usual, hurl anathemas against 
Cromwell ; and if he go into the " Lady Chapel " 
and see every head of every statue (and their name 
is legion) systematically knocked off, he will feel a 
pious indignation too against the doer of it ; but he 
will assoil the soul of Cromwell, as being engaged 
in bigger business of destruction than this. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE UNIVERSITIES. 

The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge are 
wonderfully well matched in point of historical in- 
terest, size, and picturesque beauty of buildings and 
situation. Oxford, as a city, has some superior ad- 
vantages over Cambridge, and its one magnificent 
High Street is unrivaled. But there are particular 
points in Cambridge more striking than any thing 
in Oxford. Nothing in Oxford is so majestic as 
King's College Chapel in Cambridge, nor so lovely 
as the grounds behind Trinity College ; and I was 
struck with the positive resemblances between Ox- 
ford and Cambridge. Both are situated on slightly 
rising ground, with broad green meadows and a flat, 
fenny country stretching around them. The wind- 
ing and muddy Cam, holding the city in its arm, 
might be easily taken for the fond but still more 
capricious Isis, though both of them are insignificant 
streams ; and Jesus' College Green and Midsummer 
Common at Cambridge, correspond to Christ Church 
Meadows and those bordering the Cherwell at Ox- 
ford. At a little distance, the profile of Cambridge 
is almost precisely like that of Oxford, while glori- 
ous King's College Chapel makes up all deficiencies 



266 OLD ENGLAND. 

in the architectural features and outline of Cam- 
bridge. 

Starting from Bull Inn, we will not linger long 
in the streets, though we might be tempted to 
do so by the luxurious book-shops, but will make 
straight for the gateway of Trinity College. This 
gateway is itself a venerable and imposing struct- 
ure, although a mass of houses clustered about it 
destroys its unity with the rest of the college build- 
ings. Between its two heavy battlemented towers 
is a statue of Edward III. and his coat-of-arms ; 
and over the gate Sir Isaac Newton had his ob- 
servatory. 

This gateway introduces into a noble court, called 
the Great Court, with a carved stone fountain or 
canopied well in the centre, and buildings of irregu- 
lar sizes and different ages inclosing it. The chapel 
which forms the northern side of this court dates 
back to 1564. In the ante-chapel, or vestibule, 
stands the statue of Sir Isaac Newton, by Roubilliac, 
bearing the inscription, " Qui genus humanum in- 
genio superavit ! " It is spirited, but, like all the 
works of this artist, unnaturally attenuated. The 
head is compact rather than large, and the forehead 
square rather than high. The face has an expres- 
sion of abstract contemplation, and is looking up, as 
if the mind were just fastening upon the beautiful 
law of light which is suggested by the hand hold- 
ing a prism. By the door of the screen entering 
into the chapel proper, are the sitting statues of Sir 
Francis Bacon and Dr. Isaac Barrow, two more 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 267 

giants of this college. The former represents the 
philosopher in a sitting posture, wearing his high- 
crowned hat, and leaning thoughtfully upon his 
hand. Isaac Barrow, who sits beside him, though 
a wonderfully learned man, was sometimes what 
old English authors called a " painful preacher." 
On one occasion, after preaching three full hours, 
the organ set up to play, and fairly blew him down ; 
and being afterward asked if he were not fatigued 
by so great an intellectual effort, he replied, that 
" indeed he did feel slightly fatigued with standing 
up that time." 

There is also in this vestibule the effigy of a 
ruder Trinity Anak still, Dr. Porson. At evening 
prayers in this chapel I could fully agree with the 
remark of Mr. Bristed, who was a student of Trin- 
ity, that a company of smooth-faced youths in white 
surplices have a certain " innocent look," as if they 
were a choir of Fra Angelico's angels. 

The hall of Trinity College, which separates the 
Great Court from the Inner or Neville Court, 
(courts in Cambridge, quads in Oxford,) is the 
glory of the college. Its interior is upward of one 
hundred feet in length, oak-wainscoted, with deep 
beam-work ceiling, now black with age, and an 
enormous fireplace, which in winter still blazes 
with its old hospitable glow. At the upper end 
where the professors and fellows sit, hang the por- 
traits of Bacon and Newton. I had the honor of 
dining in this most glorious of banqueting-halls, at 
the invitation of a fellow of the college. Before 



268 OLD ENGLAND. 

meals, the ancient Latin grace, somewhat abbre- 
viated, is pronounced. 

On the side of the hall, and in the same build- 
ing, is the college kitchen. A glance at the scien- 
tific operations of this purely physical department 
of the University, at the gigantic spits and pans, the 
vast turtle-shells and pantry-moulds, the hills of 
potted meats, pickles, and preserves, the cavernous 
fireplaces, huge cranes and brawny scullions, the 
blaze, the stir, the hissing activity, would convince 
one that England dines her scholars bravely every 
day — those of them, at least, who can pay for it. 

In the centre of the same range of buildings is 
the Combination Room, an elegantly furnished par- 
lor, ornamented with portraits, where the fellows 
of the college retire after dinner to discuss their 
dessert and university politics. Upon the side- 
board I noticed a large and elaborate wedding-cake, 
recently sent in by a fellow to his quondam bach- 
elor friends, this being the immemorial penalty of 
his having given up their fellowship, and the selfish 
luxuries of his former bachelor condition for a much 
better fellowship. 

We pass through the hall into Neville Court, 
three sides of which are cloistered, and in the east- 
ern end of which stands the fine library building, 
built through the exertions of Dr. Barrow, who 
was determined that nothing in Oxford should sur- 
pass his own darling college. The library room is 
nearly two hundred feet long, with tesselated mar- 
ble floor, and with the busts of the great men of 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 269 

Trinity ranged around the walls. The wood-carv- 
ings of Grinling Gibbons that adorn this room, of 
flowers, fruit, wheat, grasshoppers, birds, are of 
singular beauty, and make the hard oak fairly blos- 
som and live. This library contains the most com- 
plete collection of the various editions of Shaks- 
peare's Works which exists. Thorwaldsen's statue 
of Byron, who was a student of this college, stands 
at the south end of the room. It represents him in 
the bloom of youth, attired as a pilgrim, with pencil 
in hand and a broken Grecian column at his feet. 
Take any group of people, old men and children, 
middle-aged men and beautiful maidens, and how- 
ever much of power, loveliness, and poetry there 
may be in the group, yet let a young man in the 
first glory of his strength and beauty pass by, and 
he has the homage of all hearts — he is king of all. 
But add to this genius, like a visible crown on his 
open brow and clustering locks, as Byron is here 
represented, and he is irresistible. The poet is set 
before us as we all wish he might have been, and 
perhaps could have been, but was not. It is the 
ideal poet of the "Childe Harold " — he who led cap- 
tive at his will the old and young, the good and bad, 
the high and low, of the last generation of men. 
It is surely a cause of sincere thankfulness that the 
day of Byron has passed away, especially among 
the young in our colleges ; and that the day of a 
far nobler, purer, and profounder poet, Tennyson, 
has risen like a day-spring from on high. 

One is here shown the cast of Newton's face, 



270 OLD ENGLAND. 

taken after death ; also his own telescope, and many 
of his mathematical instruments, extremely rude 
and simple, showing that it is not the perfection of 
the instrument or the tool that makes the great as- 
tronomer or discoverer, but the force of the brain 
and the spiritual eye that lie behind it. Trinity 
has some five hundred scholars and about sixty fel- 
lows ; and it is not too much to say that, with its 
ancient names and associates, its modern corps of 
instruction, and the number of its students, it is 
the first and most illustrious single college in the 
world. 

As to the numbers in the entire Cambridge Uni- 
versity, I have seen this statement recently made, 
and believe it to be correct : There are 517 ma- 
triculants, and the whole number of residents is 
2038, of whom 1226 are in the colleges, and 812 
are lodgers. 

The west end of Trinity borders on the Cam, 
and we will now take a look at a few of the colleges 
lying along upon the river bank. 

The next neighbor to Trinity on the north, and 
the next in point of size and importance in the Uni- 
versity, is St. John's College. It has four courts, 
one opening into the other. It also is jealously 
surrounded by its high walls, and its entrance is by 
a ponderous old tower, having a statue of St. John 
the Evangelist over the gateway. Through a cov- 
ered bridge, not unlike " the Bridge of Sighs," 
one passes over the stream to a group of modern 
majestic castellated buildings of yellow stone be- 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 271 

longing to this college. The grounds, walks, and 
thick groves connected with this building form 
an elegant academic shade, and tempt to a life 
of exclusive study and scholarly accumulation, of 
growing fat in learning, without perhaps growing 
muscular in the effort to use it. The plan of fel- 
lowships, which is the peculiar feature of the Eng- 
lish University, and which often is continued in by 
a scholar for a whole life, is a remnant of monkish 
days, of the celibacy of the clergy, and must inev- 
itably lead to this life of literary epicureanism. It 
has, however, its advantages. A fellow of Oxford 
told a friend of mine that while thirty-nine good 
men were spoiled by it, the fortieth man was a grand 
production — perhaps the topmost perfection of sci- 
ence and civilization. There is some truth in this. 
Ample time is given, and every other outward aid, 
for the slow and symmetric development of a noble 
intellect. The genial sun shines on it for years, 
and its roots strike down into the rich soil of ancient 
learning, of the mould of ages, till its top reaches 
heaven. But we in America could ill afford to 
spoil so many good trees in order to make one tall 
mast. We prefer our own system of college edu- 
ation, which brings up more minds to an evenly 
high level of mental cultivation, practical scholar- 
ship, and general usefulness. Our collegiate sys- 
tem might perhaps combine something of this Eng- 
lish system of fellowships in the modified system 
of scholarships, extending somewhat beyond the 
term of the college course, and which is already 



272 OLD ENGLAND. 

the tendency in our colleges. The system of Eng- 
lish fellowships, it is said, produces the pure love 
of study ; the desire of human applause dies out ; 
the popular ends or rewards of scholarship are de- 
spised : and the love of learning for itself alone be- 
comes the great incentive. A university man will 
often bring out, with immense labor and learning, 
an anonymous edition of a difficult Latin author, or 
an elegant translation of a Greek dramatist. He 
shuns public notice. He sticks to his incognito, or 
goes on noiselessly heaping up lore and producing 
learned works, that in any other country would 
make him a distinguished name. 

We give an extract from a curious account of 
the manners of scholars at St. John's in the reign 
of Edward VI., commending it to the attention of 
our American young gentlemen, who sometimes 
complain of the hardships of college life : — " There 
be dyverse ther, which ryse dayly betwixt foure 
and fyve of the clocke in the mornynge, and from 
fyve untill sixe of the clocke use commen prayer, 
with an exhortation of God's worde, in a common 
chappell, and from sixe unto ten of the clocke use 
eyther private study or commune lectures. At 
tenne of the clocke they go to dynner, where they 
be content with a penye pyece of biefe among 
foure, havynge a few porage made of the brothe 
of the same biefe wythe salte and otemel, and noth- 
eng else. After dynner, they go eyther teachynge 
or learnynge untill fyve of the clocke in the even- 
ynge, when they have a supper not much better 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 273 

than the diner ; immedyately after the whyche, 
they go eyther to reasonynge in problemes, or into 
some other studye, untill it be nine or tenne of the 
clocke, and there beynge without fyre are fayne to 
walke or runne up and downe halfe an houre to 
gette a heate on thire feete when they go to bed." 

Among the eminent men of St. John's College 
are Ben Jonson, Stillingfleet, and Sir Robert Cecil. 
This was also Henry Kirke White's college ; and 
a monument has been erected to his memory in 
the Church of all Saints by an American. A far 
greater poet, William Wordsworth, was educated 
here, and it was a college vacation trip to Switz- 
erland that was the occasion of the poems called 
" Descriptive Sketches," which were his first pub- 
lication. 

On the other side of Trinity, to the south, is 
Trinity Hall, a small college, and almost exclusive- 
ly devoted to law studies. Its buildings are not 
remarkable. Frederick Denison Maurice and his 
brother-in-law, John Sterling, came here from 
Trinity College. Maurice was then a Dissenter, 
and for that reason could not take advantage of the 
fellowship which was offered him. 

Directly to the west of Trinity Hall is Gonville 
and Caius College, called in Cambridge parlance 
"Keys." The southern court has three gates — 
of Humility, Virtue, and Honor. The edifices are 
of the Italian style, and their appearance is quiet 
and scholastic. Jeremy Taylor — the golden- 
mouthed preacher, whose imagination was Oriental 

18 



274 OLD ENGLAND. 

even under the foggy skies of England — studied 
in this college. 

Next to the north of Trinity Hall is beautiful 
Clare Hall. In the civil war this college suffered 
greatly, and especially its chapel. The following 
is an item from the report of the Parliamentary 
commission : — " We destroyed in the presence of 
Mr. Gunny, fellow, 3 cherubims, the 12 apostles, 
a cross, and 6 of the fathers, and ordered the steps 
to be levelled." The long river-front of this col- 
lege is exceedingly elegant, being built in the Ital- 
ian style of the 17th century. Seating one's self 
upon the river-bank, under the great willow-tree at 
the southern angle of this hall, one may watch the 
young men darting by in their narrow u shells," 
and disappearing like noiseless phantoms under 
the shadowy arches of the old bridge. Beautiful, 
dreamy college life ! how swiftly it glides into and 
under the dark shadows of the actual, and its free 
joyousness vanishes ! 

King's College, founded by Henry VII., from 
whom it takes its name, comes next in order. Its 
wealthy founder, who, like his son, loved architect- 
ural pomp, had great designs in regard to this insti- 
tution, which were cut off by his death, but the 
massive unfinished gateway of the old building 
stands as a regal specimen of what the whole plan 
would have been had it been carried out. Henry 
VIII., however, perfected some of his father's de- 
signs on a scale of true magnificence. King's Col- 
lege Chapel, the glory of Cambridge and England, 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 275 

is in the Perpendicular style of English Gothic. 
It is three hundred and sixteen feet long, eighty- 
four feet broad, its sides ninety feet, and its tower 
one hundred and forty-six feet high. Its lofty inte- 
rior stone roof in the fan-tracery form of groined 
ceiling, has the appearance of being composed of 
immense white scallop-shells, with heavy corbels 
of rich flowers and bunches of grapes suspended at 
their points of junction. The ornamental emblem 
of the Tudor rose and portcullis is carved in every 
conceivable spot and nook. Twenty-four stately 
and richly painted windows, divided into the strong 
vertical lines of the Perpendicular style, and crossed 
at right angles by lighter transoms and more deli- 
cate circular mouldings, with the great east and 
west windows flashing in the most vivid and superb 
colors, make it a gorgeous vision of light and glory. 
One could wish that the clumsy wooden screen in 
the centre of the chapel were away, so that he 
might at a glance see the whole length and breadth 
and height of this truly august room. It has been 
sometimes compared to the Sistine Chapel at 
Rome ; but with all the advantages of Michael 
Angelo's adorning hand in the wonderful frescoes 
of the chapel, that is but a dull and cavernous 
apartment, something belonging to this earth, com- 
pared with the soaring majesty and ethereal splen- 
dors of this gem of Gothic architecture. This is 
an instance of the last pure English Gothic. 

Queen's College, the next south upon the river, is 
distinguished as the residence of Erasmus during his 



276 OLD ENGLAND. 

second visit to England from 1510 to 1516. He 
suffered much persecution and obloquy in his at- 
tempt to introduce the study of Greek into Cam- 
bridge, which study was, curiously enough, still 
more obstinately opposed at Oxford. Erasmus 
speaks of the educational condition of Cambridge 
in his day thus : — " About thirty years ago noth- 
ing was taught in the University of Cambridge 
except Alexander, (the middle-age Latin poem of 
Walter de Castellio) the Parva Logicalia, as they 
called them, (a scholastic treatise written by Petrus 
Hispanus,) and three old dictates of Aristotle, and 
questions of Scotus. In process of time there was 
an accession of good learning : a knowledge of 
mathematics was introduced ; then came in a new 
or at least a regenerate Aristotle ; the knowledge 
of the Greek literature was added, with so many au- 
thors whose very names were not formerly known." 
We do indeed owe the revival of sound learning in 
England, as well as on the Continent, to the Ref- 
ormation. This college has two courts. There is 
a fine terrace-walk on the opposite bank of the 
river shaded by noble elms. 

Turning now from the river-side, and continuing 
our stroll along Trumpington Street, we come to 
St. Peter's College, the oldest foundation in Cam- 
bridge, having been established in 1257. We 
sometimes speak of old Yale and old Harvard, but 
when we look upon a college which dates back to 
the time of the Crusades, when much of Europe 
as well as Asia was still lying in heathen darkness, 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 277 

we feel that our American colleges are but wild 
young children of the forest and of yesterday. St. 
Peter's was originally, as most of the older colleges 
were, an ecclesiastical " hostel," half-convent, half- 
hospital ; its buildings are modernized and are not 
noteworthy. The celebrated Puritan general, 
Colonel Hutchinson, was educated here. 

On the same street, and nearly opposite St. 
Peter's, is Pembroke College, a most interesting 
and venerable pile, with a quaint gable front. Its 
buildings are small, and it is said, for some greatly 
needed city improvement, will probably be soon 
torn down ; on hearing which, I thought, would 
that some genius like Aladdin's, or some angel who 
bore through the air the chapel of the " Lady of 
Loretto," might bear these old buildings bodily to 
our land and set them down on the Yale grounds, so 
that we might exchange their picturesque antiquity 
for the present college buildings, which, though 
endeared to us by many associations, are like a row 
of respectable brick factories. 

Edmund Spenser and William Pitt belonged to 
Pembroke ; and Gray, the poet, driven from St. 
Peter's by the pranks and persecutions of his 
fellow-students, spent the remainder of his uni- 
versity life here. Some of the cruel, practical 
jokes inflicted upon a timid and delicate nature 
sound like the modern days of " hazing freshmen." 
Among his other fancies and fears, Gray was known 
to be especially afraid of fire, and kept always 
coiled up in his room a rope-ladder, in case of 



278 OLD ENGLAND. 

emergency. By a preconcerted signal, on a dark 
winter night, a tremendous cry of fire was raised 
in the court below, which caused the young poet 
to leap out of bed and to hastily descend his rope- 
ladder into a mighty tub of ice-cold water, set for 
that purpose. 

St. Katharine's Hall is also situated on Trump- 
ington Street, immediately to the south of King's 
College. It is distinguished for the great number 
of eminent theologians who have been educated 
within its walls, among whom was Thomas Sher- 
lock. It is a small college and its buildings are 
plain. Corpus Christi, just opposite, has a towered 
and battlemented frontage, and its buildings are of 
imposing Tudor architecture. 

Following up Trumpington and Trinity Streets 
to the north, we come into Bridge Street, which is 
continued along in Magdalene Street, upon which 
is Magdalene College, standing also partly on the 
river, which curves in here. Its library contains 
the valuable antique collection of black letter vol- 
umes of Samuel Pepys. Charles Kingsley was a 
student of Magdalene. It is called a plain college ; 
but what would be called plain in the Old World 
would be elaborately ornamental with us. 

Coming back to Bridge Street, and turning to 
the west into Jesus' Lane, we arrive at Jesus' Col- 
lege, a most delightful and retired spot, the very 
home and haunt of the Muses. The old saying 
is, " Pray at King's, eat at Trinity, and study at 
Jesus." Springing out of an ancient nunnery, it 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 279 

still retains its antique cloisters and its grave and 
almost austere ecclesiastical character. The gar- 
den and grounds are of dark and rich luxuriance, 
and will compare with any in Oxford. It has been 
a college about five hundred years, having been 
founded four years after the discovery of America. 
The number of students is now small, averaging 
some sixty. Archbishop Cranmer was a scholar 
of this foundation. Coleridge's room is in the 
oldest and dingiest portion of the edifice, looking 
out upon the secluded garden. But the outside of 
these college rooms gives little idea of the comfort 
and oftentimes luxury of their interior ; and when 
the rough oak " sporting-door," as it is called, 
opens upon apartments which unite the privacy 
of ancient monkish seclusion with the elegant ease 
of the modern refined and wealthy man of letters, 
the visitor, if he come from the New World, with 
its simpler ideas of college life and manners, is 
filled with astonishment. Returning to Bridge 
Street, at the corner of Jesus' Lane and Bridge 
Street, we come upon Sidney Sussex College, with 
its formal high-stepped gable-ends, founded in 1596 
by the aunt of Sir Philip Sidney. The buildings 
are of the later Elizabethan style, with red brick 
copings. The master's garden connected with this 
college is a pleasant and shut-in spot, with an 
abundance of old trees, and is almost as shadowy 
and solitary as the heart of a forest. These gar- 
dens and parks are a prime feature of the English 
University. They are kept in exquisite trim, and 



280 OLD ENGLAND. 

are rich with beds of bright, rare flowers, and beau- 
tiful with their smooth-shorn lawns, filled with that 
soft, mossy-velvet turf — that "living green" — 
so peculiar to misty England. What could be a 
more grateful resort for the weary student than to 
be able to spend a few moments in one of these 
still and noble gardens ; and what is more purify- 
ing and vivifying to the mind itself than this daily 
contact with the most beautiful things and sights of 
Nature ? It is grievous to think that our Ameri- 
can colleges were not able to reserve for themselves 
broader grounds for the free cultivation of Nature 
about them ; that, instead of being placed in the 
centre of bustling towns, they could not have been 
more entirely secluded or shut in from the noisy 
outside world by a screen of shady trees and quiet 
meadows, and thus been wholly consecrated to the 
purposes of study and spiritual improvement. 

Sidney Sussex and Immanuel Colleges were 
called by Archbishop Laud " the nurseries of Puri- 
tanism." The college-book of Sidney Sussex con- 
tains this record : ifc Oliverus Cromwell Hunting- 
doniensis aclmissus ad commeatum sociorum Aprilis 
vicesimo sexto, tutore mag. Richardo Howlet 
[1616]." He had just completed his seventeenth 
year. Cromwell's father dying the next year, and 
leaving but a small estate, the young " Protector " 
was obliged to leave college for more practical pur- 
suits. " But some Latin," Bishop Burnet said, 
" stuck to him." An oriel window, looking upon 
Bridge Street, is pointed out as marking his room ; 



THE UNIVERSITIES. . 281 

and in the master's lodge is a likeness of Cromwell 
in his later years, said to be the best extant. The 
gray hair is parted in the middle of the forehead, 
and hangs down long upon the shoulders, like that 
of Milton. The forehead is high and swelling, 
with a deep line sunk between the eyes. The 
eyes are gray. The complexion is florid and mot- 
tled, and all the features rugged and large. Heavy, 
corrugated furrows of decision and resolute will are 
plowed about the mouth, and the lips are shut like 
a vice. Otherwise, the face has a calm and be- 
nevolent look, not unlike that of Benjamin Frank- 
lin. Indeed — although in an aesthetic point of 
view the comparison might not be considered a 
flattering one by the distinguished clergyman — 
the face struck me as bearing a rough likeness to 
the leading minister of New Haven. In Sidney 
Sussex, Cromwell's College, and in two or three 
other colleges of Cambridge University, we find 
the head-sources of English Puritanism, which, in 
its best form, was no wild and unenlightened en- 
thusiasm, but the product of thoughtful and edu- 
cated mind. We shall come soon upon the name 
of Milton. John Robinson, our national father, 
and the Moses of our national exodus, as well as 
Elder Brewster, John Cotton, and many others of 
the principal Puritan leaders and divines, were 
educated at Cambridge. Sir Henry Vane, the 
younger, whom Macintosh regarded as not inferior 
to Bacon in depth of intellect, and to whom Milton 
addressed the sonnet, who was chosen Governor 



282 OLD ENGLAND. 

of Massachusetts, and who infused much of his 
own thoughtful and profound spirit into Puritan 
institutions at home and in America, was a student 
of Magdalene College, Oxford. 

A little further on to the south of Sidney Sus- 
sex, upon St. Andrew's Street, is Christ's College. 
The front and gate are old ; the other buildings 
are after a design by Inigo Jones. In the garden 
stands the famous mulberry-tree said to have been 
planted by Milton. It is still vigorous, though 
carefully propped up and mounded around, and its 
aged trunk is sheathed with lead. The martyr 
Latimer, John Howe, the prince of theological 
writers, and Archdeacon Paley, belonged to this 
college • but its most brilliant name is that of John 
Milton. He entered in 1624 ; took the degree of 
Bachelor of Arts in 1628, and that of Master of 
Arts in 1632. This is the entry in the college rec- 
ord: "Johannes Milton Londinensis, films Johan- 
nis, institutus fuit in literarum elementis sub magis 
tro Hill gymnasii Paulini prsefecto, admissus est pen- 
sionarius minor, Feb. 12, 1624, sub M ro ' Chappell, 
solvitque pro ingr. 0. 10s. 0$." Milton has indig- 
nantly defended himself against the slander of his 
political enemies, that he left college in disgrace, 
and calls it " a commodious lie." In answer to the 
scornful question as to u what were his ways while 
at the University," he says : " Those morning 
haunts are what they should be at home, not sleep- 
ing, or concocting the surfeits of an irregular feast, 
but up and stirring — in winter, often ere the sound 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 283 

of any bell awoke men to labor or to devotion ; in 
summer, as oft with the bird that first rouses, or not 
much tardier, to read good authors, or cause them 
to be read, till the attention be weary, or memory 
have its full fraught ; then with useful and gener- 
ous labors preserving the body's health and hardi- 
ness to render lightsome, clear, and not lumpish 
obedience to the mind, to the cause of religion and 
our country's liberty, in sound bodies to stand and 
cover their stations." There are similar words of 
Milton which ought to be engraved on the heart of 
every young man and scholar : " He who would 
not be frustrated of his hope to write well hereafter 
in laudable things, ought of himself to be a true 
poem, that is, a composition and pattern of the best 
and honorablest things ; not presuming to sing the 
high praises of heroic men and famous cities, unless 
he has himself the experiences and the practice of 
all that is praiseworthy." When we reflect that 
Milton came within a hair's breadth of laying his 
own gray head on the block, and in fact invited 
death with unbending will for truth's sake, we may 
see in him that " true poem " of a heroic life. It 
is noticeable that Cambridge has produced all the 
great poets ; Oxford, with her yearnings and striv- 
ings, none. Milton were glory enough ; but Spen- 
ser, Gray, Byron, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Tenny- 
son (a Lincolnshire man), may be thrown in. It 
might be said of Cambridge, as Dr. Johnson said 
of Pembroke College, " We are a nest of singing 
birds here." Milton, from the extreme elegance 



284 OLD ENGLAND. 

of his person and liis mind, rather than from any 
effeminateness of character, was called while in the 
University, " the lady of Christ's College." The 
young poet could not have been inspired by out- 
ward Nature in his own room ; for the miniature 
dormer-windows are too high to look out of at all. 
It is a small attic chamber, with very steep narrow 
stairs leading up to it. The name of " Milton " 
(so it is said to be, though hard to make out) is 
cut in the old oaken door. 

Upon the same street, further to the south, is 
Emmanuel College, " a seminary, " as it has been 
called, " for Puritan divines." Its founder, Sir 
Walter Mildmay, was the leader of the Puritan 
party in Queen Elizabeth's day ; and during the im- 
mediately succeeding reigns the college flourished 
beyond any other. It sent forth a great number 
of preachers, who gave a mighty impulse to the 
spiritual and political struggles of those days. 
Would it be too much to trace our own religious 
and political liberties back to this and its sister col- 
leges ? This college is intimately and peculiarly 
American in its names and associations. John 
Robinson, Samuel Stone and Thomas Hooker the 
founders of Connecticut, together with Thomas 
Shepard, and Henry Dunster the second president 
of Harvard College, were graduates of Emmanuel. 
This college has a long and more modern Ionic 
front upon the street, though some of its buildings 
are old, and of the Tudor Gothic style. Ralph 
Cudworth was a student of Emmanuel. 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 285 

Following St. Andrew's Street down into Re- 
gent Street, we come upon the extensive grounds 
and classic edifices of Downing College, the young- 
est of the university brood, founded in 1800 by Sir 
George Downing, the descendant of a distinguished 
Puritan statesman of the same name. Downing; 
College has some peculiarities in the terms of its 
admissions and fellowships. 

We have now walked around all the colleges ; 
and even from this glance we can, I think, see that 
these venerable piles, these names of living power, 
these portraits of great Englishmen adorning the 
public halls where the students gather morning and 
evening, these historic scenes and walks and shades, 
are in themselves strong inspiring forces to awaken 
the best ambition of young minds. Why could we 
not now begin to have in our own colleges more of 
this sensible appeal to the past, more of the influ- 
ence of the commemorative arts, to stimulate the 
forming educated mind of the country and draw it 
toward lofty aims and ideas ? 

I was so fortunate, or perhaps unfortunate, as to 
be in Oxford during " Commemoration " week. 
Its heat, bustle, and confusion remind one vividly 
of " Commencement " season at Yale or Harvard. 
The town was so full that I was obliged to find 
lodgings in Woodstock, eight miles distant. Every 
vehicle had also been forestalled, though at last an 
antique chariot was dragged to light, whose bowl- 
like body, with its perked-up lofty ends, the one 
precisely like the other, made it resemble a Roman 



286 OLD ENGLAND. 

galley, such as might have been used in the sea- 
fight at Actium. Nevertheless, a comfortable voy- 
age was made to the " Bear Inn," Woodstock. In 
good season the next morning, of a bright hot July 
day, I returned to Oxford. Across the flat mead- 
ows and through the shimmering summer air the 
elegant spires and domes of Oxford appeared ; and 
on passing " Martyr's Memorial," the general 
movement and stir of the great day was already 
visible in the wide half-rural street. The shovel- 
crowned Oxford caps and billowy black silk gowns 
of the collegians, were rapidly sailing to and fro ; 
multitudes of ladies were astir to secure good 
places ; and the more ponderous bodies of univer- 
sity dignitaries were beginning to slowly collect 
their forces. The point of interest was the build- 
ing called the " Theatre," on Broad Street, and a 
crowd of visitors had gathered at the closed iron 
gate that opened into the yard in front of the 
" schools." Here stood the proctors, or in Oxford 
parlance, " pokers," keeping guard with their long 
sticks. Rolls of thunderous noise came from the 
impatient students assembled within the building. 
By the courtesy of a doctor of divinity, in scarlet 
robe, with sleeves of black velvet, I at length 
gained admission. There the scene was peculiar. 
The room is a lofty circular area, and the under- 
graduates were clustered like a great swarm of 
bees, tier above tier, in the upper galleries. There 
was a circle of ladies in the lower gallery ; but it 
must have been a considerable trial of the nerves 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 287 

for them to remain there. Surely, it was a won- 
derfully noisy time, for English lungs are powerful. 
There is very fair wit sometimes struck out by the 
students on Commemoration Day ; but I must say 
that I did not hear any, perhaps from the fact that 
it was so difficult to hear any thing at all. For one 
just from the New World — from the woods as it 
were — feeling a proper sense of awe in regard to 
all things connected with a university founded by 
Alfred the Great, it was rather odd to be suddenly 
ushered into such a babel and roar of nonsense, 
proceeding from the throats of the express flower of 
British youth. 

As the begowned regents, doctors, and officials 
of high and low degree began to assemble and take 
their seats on a lower circle of the proscenium, 
there was now a general groan for some one, called 
out by name, and then a tremendous hurra for 
another, but the groans predominated. Brays of 
donkeys, crowings of cocks, laughings of hyenas, 
and all the uncommon sounds that a crowd of col- 
lege boys, totally unrestrained and stimulated by 
rivalry, can make, gave the only variety to the 
steady Bull-of-Bashan roar kept up by all. Wit, 
sharp and saucy, would have been a relief; but, as 
I say, I did not hear it. The capital hit at Tenny- 
son, some years ago, made by a collegian, is quite 
familiar perhaps to my readers, but will bear re- 
peating. The poet is said to be as negligent in his 
personal appearance and dress as poets commonly 
are. That morning as he came into the " Thea- 



288 OLD ENGLAND. 

tre " and took his seat among the distinguished 
guests, he was particularly unkempt and uncared 
for in the outer man. .A cool, drawling voice was 
heard from the highest student gallery, saying : 
" Did your mother call you early, Mr. Tennyson?" 
The pensive author of " May Queen " might have 
been excused for laughing heartily. 

At length the High Chancellor rose — a fine- 
looking, dignified man — and putting on his cap, 
pronounced the usual opening Latin address. For 
a few moments he was allowed to proceed quietly, 
and I thought that the famous Oxford saturnalia 
was ended, and that the regular exercises of the 
day had begun. But no ! A voice from the stu- 
dent tiers began to mimic the tone of the speaker ; 
then as any personal eulogistic allusion occurred, 
some one would squeak out, " Put it on strong ! " 
Then there would be a general clamor, and several 
times in the course of the twenty minutes' address, 
the Vice-Chancellor was compelled to stop, trying 
to look composed, but, as it appeared to me, feeling 
considerably chafed. A Latin essay was then read, 
interrupted at every sentence by " We 've heard 
that before," and " The rest to be understood," etc. 
The speaker struggled gallantly through, like a 
stanch craft in a hurricane. Any tendency to 
the Ciceronian was instantly greeted with sarcastic 
shrieks, and rotund Latin sentences, with plenty of 
qualificatives and superlatives, helped out the ora- 
tor's sentences in the same tone in which they were 
delivered, only " a little more so." So also fared 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 289 

the addresses of the Professor of Civil Law and the 
Public Orator. But the pieces of the undergradu- 
ates were much less interrupted. They were, 
however, hurried through in low, monotonous 
voices, and at railroad speed, as if the speaker 
either feared the " boys-terous " comment or de- 
spised the part he was performing. The Newde- 
gate or Prize Poem — the same for which Reginald 
Heber wrote his " Palestine " — was well deliv- 
ered, and had a happily chosen theme, touching 
successfully now and then the chord of British pat- 
riotism, and calling forth great applause. There 
was also a Carmen Latinum, by a student of Balliol 
College. After the exercises, which were rather 
bluntly concluded, were ended, I had time to look 
about the " Theatre." It was designed by Sir 
Christopher Wren, and was the gift of Archbishop 
Sheldon, whose plan in its foundation was to remove 
the secular ceremonies of the University from sa- 
cred buildings — a hint for our colleges. Here 
are celebrated " all the public acts of the Univer- 
sity, the Comitia and Encoenia, and Lord Crewe's 
annual commemoration of founders and benefac- 
tors " — the great day at Oxford. This building 
forms one of that constellation of grand old edifices, 
made by the schools, the Bodleian Library, the 
Radcliffe Library, and Christ Church, which are 
the common heart and centre of the University. 

The stone of which the Oxford College buildings 
are built is unfortunately a very soft stone, and the 
present ragged, scarred, and peeled condition of 

19 



290 OLD -ENGLAND. 

those beautiful structures can hardly be imagined. 
Some of them are completely honey-combed. In 
many instances they are rebuilding, or rather mak- 
ing over the edifice stone for stone, in exactly the 
old style and pattern. 

The ivy-mantled walls, green archery lawns, 
shadowy walks, brown sombre buildings, and ven- 
erable quadrangles of New College, William of 
Wykeham's College, especially delighted me. 
This is fed by the tributary of Winchester school, 
itself a titular college. 

Old Exeter is undergoing a thorough transforma- 
tion, and looks astonished at her own youthful 
magnificence. Her new chapel rivals the ancient 
glories of the place, especially in its stone and 
wood carvings, in which delicate passion-flowers, 
cut in oak, wreathe in with vine-leaves and lilies. 
Froude the historian studied at Exeter, and there 
caught the new impulse for historical studies which 
Dr. Arnold introduced from Germany. The beau- 
tiful soaring spire of St. Mary's Church, a majestic 
wedge, so strong and yet so light, and the square 
and pinnacled tower of Magdalen College, upon 
which the Latin anthem is sung every New- Year's 
morn, form the striking landmarks of Oxford, seen 
far over the flat meadows. 

One is tempted to lay irreverent hand upon the 
smooth-worn monster brass nose of the gate of 
Brasenose College. It is said, however, that the 
name of the college has nothing to do with " Brass," 
but was derived from " Brasin-hous," the ancient 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 291 

name of " Brew-house." Bishop Heber was a stu- 
dent of this college. 

Most appropriately has this college honored the 
memory of another of her noblest sons, Frederick 
W. Robertson, with a memorial window in the 
chapel, surmounted by the inscription on a scroll 
" Te Deum laudat prophetarum laudabilis nume- 
rus." By his splendid powers that burned out 
with their own energy so quickly, and by his 
thoughts that seem to enter into the very shekinah 
of spiritual Truth, he has lighted the dark and 
struggling way of thousands. The true life which 
he lived, the great " fight of faith " which he waged, 
reflect back a purer glory on his college, than if he 
had fallen (as he sometimes wished to do) in the 
trenches before Sebastopol, or had won the fame of 
the first scholar on earth. In these walls he con- 
secrated his early manhood to Christ ; and it was 
all his life his constant thought and prayer how he 
might aid young men, especially educated young 
men, in their conflicts and doubts to come to the 
same Master, and find in him a higher light than 
that of learning — "to begin in youth to say with 
David, O God, thou art my God, early will I seek 
thee." 

Oriel, Dr. Arnold's college, is the most battered 
and worn-looking of all the University buildings, 
which, taken together, form a kind of monumental 
history of England, exhibiting all its great historic 
epochs. The sombre influence even of Spain may 
be clearly traced in their architecture. 



292 OLD ENGLAND. 

Queen's College, where the " boar's head " is 
served up on Christmas in memory of the legend 
of the student's escape by thrusting a volume of 
Aristotle down a wild boar's throat, has so fine a 
front on High Street that its modern style may be 
pardoned. Henry V. was once a scholar of this 
college. 

But there is nothing in Oxford which, taken as 
a whole, quite equals Christ's College, at the termi- 
nation of High Street, for the number of members 
upon its foundation, its great names, its " quads," 
and its famous " Hall," one hundred and fifteen 
feet by forty. This college, built by Cardinal 
Wolsey on the scale of his own magnificence, is 
par eminence the noblemen's college. These tufted 
gentlemen occupy at meal-time a raised platform 
by themselves — something which our republican 
taste could hardly brook, and which I have seen 
criticized in English papers. To spend a sum- 
mer's afternoon sauntering along the broad walk 
of Christ's College, looking out upon the great 
smooth meadows and shining Cherwell on one side, 
and beautiful Merton College, with its masses of 
splendid trees and gardens on the other, with now 
and then the deep tones of the big bell in " Tom 
Tower " filling the air with solemn sound, Oxford 
would seem to be a place in which to forget the 
present, to- lose the future, and to walk and muse 
life away in the dim cloisters of the past. Before 
leaving Christ's College it were well to remember 
that that great and holy man, William Tyndale, 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 293 

was educated at Oxford, and was a poor obscure 
canon of Christ's College while yet in its infancy. 
Here he conceived the plan of printing an English 
translation of the Bible, and in conversation with 
his fellow-priests who derided the idea, he said : 
" If God spare me, before many years I will cause 
a boy that driveth a plow to know more of the 
Scriptures than you do." And this leads me to 
speak of a still nobler spot in Oxford, in comparison 
with which these academic buildings, with their 
thickly clustering associations of wisdom and learn- 
ing sink into insignificance — I mean " The Mar- 
tyrs' Memorial," erected over the spot where the 
three chief martyrs of the Reformation, Cranmer, 
Ridley, and Latimer, suffered. This beautiful 
monument marks, as it were, the spiritual centre 
of England. It is such spots as these — the 
" Martyrs' Tree " at Brentwood, the place where 
Hooper was burned at Gloucester, and Smithfield 
Market — which make England holy ground. He 
who can read the account of those martyrdoms, 
especially in the fresh language of Froude, and not 
have his faith quickened and his heart filled with 
high emotion, has no English blood in his veins or 
Christian feeling in his soul. Through the death- 
less constancy of these men, we in America enjoy 
a pure faith and read a free Bible. They but testi- 
fied to, they sealed with their blood, the faith which 
already lived and burned in the hearts of the com- 
mon people of England. They were upheld by 
the encouraging words and prayers of the common 



294 OLD ENGLAND. 

people as they went to the stake. They fought 
the battle of spiritual liberty for the English people, 
and for us who now live, and for all men. 

My first impression of Oxford still remains, that 
it is the palace of the scholar — his paradise of 
literary rest, his final reward — rather than a place 
to make vigorous scholars and workingmen. Yet 
somehow or other England's great men have been 
educated here, and I have been struck by a remark 
in the " London Quarterly," drawing a comparison 
between a young man brought up at foreign uni- 
versities and an English educated youth: " At the 
moment they have left their respective places of 
education, the young Englishman has little to show 
for his time and money, while the foreign young 
man is full of information and accomplishment. 
But in ten or twelve years the tables are turned. 
The foreign university man is still ' a lad in mind, 
and a babbler on the surface of every subject.' 
The Englishman has gone into the business of life 
with a mind so trained that he grasps at will the 
necessary knowledge of the subject before him." 
There must be something in English education, 
with its everlasting drill in Latin and Greek com- 
position, and its hard metaphysics and logic, which, 
after all, develops and toughens the mental facul- 
ties. It may be narrower in range than the Ameri- 
can course of study, but it nevertheless " educates," 
draws out the intellectual powers, and gives them 
manly grip and force. It teaches men to think 
closely and write well. But it is said that in an 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 295 

Oxford education there is a want of definite aim and 
earnest principle. Beside Greek literature and 
English metaphysics, and now perhaps, since Dr. 
Arnold's time, the study of history, in the whole 
range of liberal studies which makes a man skillful 
in the business of life — especially the departments 
of physical science and modern languages — there 
is still a confessed deficiency at Oxford. Aristotle 
still rules. The physical sciences and modern 
languages have obtained no real recognition or 
solid respectable foothold at Oxford ; and the same, 
with some modification, might be said of Cam- 
bridge. Many old-fashioned ideas prevent a more 
enlarged and practical course of study. The study 
of divinity, for example, which is above all others 
a branch fitted for maturer years and for a profes- 
sional course, is pursued by academical students 
with no particular religious aim or preparation of 
spirit, and only to a superficial extent at best. Yet 
custom compels the reading of so much of Church 
history and theology, in which there is, after all, 
very little personal interest evoked. It is a system 
of getting themselves up for examinations, in which 
all the ingenuity and efforts of young men are con- 
centrated to pass a critical goal, and to make the 
show, if they have not the reality, of thorough 
scholarship. The real hard study at Oxford, we 
have the impression, is mostly done by the young 
men who are striving for scholarships and univer- 
sity prizes. These are tempting baits. They confer 
even literary and political distinction ; and some 



296 OLD ENGLAND. 

of them amount to a substantial life-income, — say 
from ^£200 to ,£400, — so that it is a university 
saying that " a high degree man supports himself 
and his mother and sisters." To obtain these 
prizes there must be excessive hard study. Men 
are trained for these mental contests with the pain- 
ful care and minute attention of physical athletes. 
They are reduced to a state of pure intellectual 
working activitv, and then " crammed " with the 
express juices of the rarest scholarship. As the 
" lecture " is the vital principle of the German 
university system, and the " recitation ' : of the 
American, so, although there are professional lec- 
tures and recitations, " private tutorage " is the 
chief characteristic of the English university meth- 
od of study. This of course adds greatly to the 
expenses of student life, but has its advantages. It 
might perhaps be introduced to a certain extent 
into our American college system, thus aiding the 
support of worthy scholars, and smoothing real 
difficulties in the path of the learner himself. For 
a young student to have the continual assistance 
of a highly scholarly mind, of a "junior wrangler" 
for instance, fresh and victorious from the arduous 
conflict, would be an immense aid in stimulating 
and directing his energies, although in manv cases 
it may produce, as it does, intellectual weakness 
and enervation. But those who do not aim at 
high degrees in the English university', may escape 
with comparatively little labor. There is not that 
uniform and steady purpose brought to bear upon 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 297 

the whole body of students that the American sys- 
tem of daily recitation and " marking " for stand 
produces. While the tone of scholarship among 
the best scholars is far higher than with us, the 
general standard both for entering and continuing 
in the University is, according to the late " Parlia- 
mentary Commissioners' Report," very imperfect. 
This Report says, among other things : " The 
standard of the matriculation examination varies at 
different colleges. At Christ Church a candidate 
is expected to construe a passage (which he has 
read before) of Virgil and another of Homer, to 
write a bit of Latin prose, to answer some simple 
grammatical questions, and show some acquaint- 
ance with arithmetic." In 1862 one third failed 
even to pass this simple test. This hardly coincides 
with Mr. Bristed's estimate of the standard of 
scholarship at the English schools. He says, " An 
Eton boy of nineteen is two years in advance of a 
Yale or Harvard valedictorian in all classical knowl- 
edge, and in all classical elegances immeasurably 
ahead of him." But Mr. Bristed, though he has 
written an admirable book, has, we know, a sort 
of chronic prejudice against American scholarship 
and American colleges. Some one has classified 
the students of Oxford into — 1, the reading men ; 
2, the idle slow men ; 3, the good kind of fellows ; 
4, the idle fast or do-nothing men ; 5, the regular 
fast men. Nevertheless, we can but acknowledge 
the superior thoroughness of English scholarship, 
its richer culture, and more permanent and sub- 



298 OLD ENGLAND. 

stantial depth. What it does do it does well 
Those who are scholars are genuine ones. They 
are inspired with a true love of sound learning 
which never leaves them. 

The moral tone of the English university is not 
so high as that of our American colleges. Infi- 
nitely more money is spent in proportion to the 
number of students for horses, sporting, wine- 
suppers, and fast living. This is partly accounted 
for by the fact that as a general thing only the v 
wealthiest class of young men can be educated at 
the two great universities, (for it would be useless 
to deny what they themselves glory in, that they 
are the highest expressions of the aristocratic prin- 
ciple in English society,) and partly from the 
simpler tone of New England and American life. 
Drinking and other vices have a lamentably free 
admission into these centres of Old-World civiliza- 
tion, where London itself is distant but half an 
hour's ride on the railroad. It were surely to be 
hoped that the young men of our American col- 
leges will strive to compete with those of Oxford 
and Cambridge and of the German Universities, 
not in their deplorable rowdyism and their ability 
to drink eighty c schoppen ' of beer apiece, but in 
their true English manliness and muscle, and their 
high German ideals of brotherhood and broad in- 
dependent culture. 

There is one admirable feature that we might 
learn from the English university — its delightfully 
genial and social spirit. This is nourished by the 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 299 

intimate family life of each particular college, hav- 
ing its own common table, home customs, and 
traditions. This sentiment of profound college 
esprit de corps never wears away, and results in 
friendships of the most tender, noble, and lasting 
kind. The Englishman's capacity for friendship, 
with all his crustaceous pride of temper, is, I have 
sometimes thought, greater than an American h ; 
and why greater ? Not from any greater depth of 
soul, but because the boy is kept fresh in him by 
the constant cultivation of early associations, and 
especially by the sympathies and memories of col- 
lege days. There is far more poetry in English col- 
lege-life than in ours. It is not so matter-of-fact. 
The continual association with what is venerable in 
the past and beautiful in Art and Nature, educates 
the heart as well as the intellect, and the whole 
man is rounded into nobler proportions. The 
" humanistic " element in education, as Mr. Glad- 
stone calls it, is more thoroughly cultivated than 
with us. There certainly should be in every en- 
lightened land those profound and tranquil springs 
of learning, removed aside from the pathway of 
traffic and the disturbing influences of a selfish, 
superficial, and money-making world ; where the 
most noble and generous susceptibilities of the na- 
ture are developed ; where youth may have its 
intellectual and spiritual ideals raised above the 
standards and successes of ordinary practical life. 
Then, when youth comes down into the world's 
agitated current, it will ride upon it strongly and 



300 OLD ENGLAND. 

safely, for it has an inward strength that is superior 
to the world. 

I need not spend time in speaking of the out- 
ward organization and government of the English 
university. Being almost entirely aristocratic, or 
more properly, oligarchical, it does not possess the 
organic unity of an American or even German 
university. It is a collection of different inde- 
pendent colleges, each absolute in its own domin- 
ions, having its own laws, existing by its own funds, 
and extremely jealous of the least infringement of 
its rights by the general government. Originally 
an ecclesiastical school attached to some religious 
house, each college still retains something of its 
exclusive monkish spirit, which stands in the way 
of very great unity of governmental discipline, and 
perhaps of rapid general improvement. 

The full title of Cambridge College is, " The 
Chancellor, Masters, and Scholars of the Univer- 
sity of Cambridge." 1 These form the general 
government, concentrated in the higher assembly, 
which is thus composed : " All persons who are 
masters of arts or doctors in one or other of the 
three faculties, viz., divinity, civil law, or physic, 
having their names upon the college boards, hold- 
ing any university office, or being resident in the 
town of Cambridge, have votes in this assembly." 
Besides this general senate, there is a more special 
council chosen yearly, called " The Caput," which 
approves of every proposal before it is submitted to 

1 Le Keux's Memorials of Cambridge. 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 301 

the senate. " The Caput consists of the vice- 
chancellor, a doctor in each of the faculties, two 
masters of arts, and other subordinate members, 
nominated by the vice-chancellor. " The meeting 
of the senate is held about once a fortnight, the 
quorum being forty members at its first session, 
and twenty-four at its second. If a motion pass 
the two houses of the senate (called regents and 
non-regents) it becomes a law. Each degree which 
is conferred undergoes the scrutiny of the senate. 
The strictly executive authority consists of a Chan- 
cellor, who is the representative head of the uni- 
versity, and who has authority for a mile around 
the town, excepting in cases of mayhem and fel- 
ony ; a high steward, who has power to try cases 
of felony ; a vice-chancellor, elected annually by 
the senate, who does the Chancellor's duty in his 
absence, and who is to all intents and purposes the 
acting head of the university, taking the place of 
our president ; a commissary ; public orator ; as- 
sessor ; two proctors ; and other minor administra- 
tive officers. There are two courts of law to try 
all cases (excepting those of mayhem and felony) 
having relation to any member of the university ; 
which courts are conducted upon the common prin- 
ciples and forms of civil law. The two members 
of Parliament from Cambridge are chosen by the 
senate. The professors' salaries are drawn from 
varied sources and from very ancient and quaint 
foundations ; some of them come directly from the 
revenue of the English government. 



302 OLD ENGLAND. 

Perhaps the grand distinguishing feature of the 
English college, which, above all others, makes it 
differ from the German and American college, is 
what has been already alluded to, its system of 
" Fellowships." The college exists, above all, for 
the benefit of its " Fellows," who enjoy its literary 
and social advantages to the utmost. From this 
body, continually replenished by the best scholars 
of the University, the lecturers, professors, and offi- 
cers are drawn. They are in fact the permanent 
nucleus, " the pillar and ground " of the university 
organization. They represent and control it. The 
students seem to come in as a secondary and neces- 
sary class, or as forming the material out of which 
" Fellows " are made and supported. 

This system, monastic in its origin, and monastic, 
until very recently, in its condition of celibacy, has 
its evil as well as its good, even as it relates to the 
" Fellows " themselves. It brings together, it is 
true, a body of highly cultivated men, who are 
constantly increasing their mental cultivation and 
heaping up erudition. But the tendency is for them 
to become refined and critical, instead of broad- 
minded and practical scholars, penetrated with the 
spirit of the age, and having living sympathy with 
living men. They are tempted to work for the 
reputation of their college, instead of the highest 
good of the multitude of young minds who come 
under their shaping influence. They do not also, 
it is averred, actually produce as much in the way 
of original scholarship as might be expected from 



THE UNIVERSITIES. 303 

such splendid opportunities. Besides, the system 
which sets a premium upon learning, and which 
makes the noblest studies the means and measure 
of pecuniary reward, cannot be considered as 
founded uppn the broadest idea of education. The 
German idea is in the main superior to this. These 
Fellowships, since they may be held for a certain 
time without residence at the University, are, I 
have seen it stated, sought for with great avidity by 
those who expect to become lawyers, physicians, 
and clergymen, and who do not intend to connect 
their lives permanently with the University; in 
this way they are afforded support and a certain 
standing, as it were, in the transition period before 
they are well able to stand by their own strength 
and efforts. The temptation in such a case would 
seem to be, to retain as long as possible that sup- 
port and stimulus, whether of a moral or pecuniary 
nature, which is so much needed at the very outset 
of a professional life. 

Therefore, while we honor and reverence these 
glorious old universities, the parents of our own 
colleges, the nurses of English learning and letters, 
we would not copy them too closely, nor would we 
hastily pronounce upon the inferiority of our own 
systems of education for our own peculiar wants 
and civilization. While the German university is 
somewhat too advanced, learned, and professional 
for our present needs, the English university is in 
some respects too exclusively national, stiff, and 
impractical for our imitation. We can learn much 



304 OLD ENGLAND. 

from both ; and so long as we have before us such 
living representatives of English university educa- 
tion as Gladstone, Goldwin Smith, Trench, Stan- 
ley, Froude, Kingsley, Ruskin, Lord Derby, Ten- 
nyson, we must feel that there is something in it 
whose depth we have not comprehended, and which 
draws from sources of life and power that are un- 
seen. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 

The Archbishop of Canterbury, in a playful 
mood, is said to have sent a message to Miss 
Marsh, the authoress of "The Life of Headley 
Vicars," asking her " when and by whom she had 
taken orders ? " I wished to see this noble Chris- 
tian woman, and the barn where she preached to 
the poor. Seven or eight miles to the south of 
London, leaving Sydenham and the Crystal Palace 
a little to the west, is Beckenham, a common coun- 
try English village, pretty enough as that part of 
Surrey County is, but in no way remarkable. 
Walking past the inn, and the butcher's shop, and 
the baker's, and the blacksmith's, I did indeed at 
last come to the barn standing in the meadows, 
where Miss Marsh collects her motley audience of 
delvers and ditchers. Her own residence is at the 
other end of the village, in a pleasant mansion set 
back a little from the road, with many fine old 
trees and a smooth lawn about it. Before I saw 
Miss Marsh I visited the village church, where 
there is a monument recently erected to the mem- 
ory of Captain Vicars. It is neatly designed, with 
the ornament of a carved sword, sash-knot and 

20 



306 OLD ENGLAND. 

scroll. This is one expression in the epitaph : 
" He fell in battle, and ' slept in Jesus ' on the 
night of the 22d of March, 1855, and was buried 
before Sebastopol." 

Miss Marsh, as she entered the parlor with a 
quiet step and a pleasant greeting, impressed me 
with her dignity and winning feminine kindliness. 
In personal appearance she is commanding and 
handsome, and she dresses with exceeding good 
taste. She does not neglect this means of personal 
influence with the poor and humble. I can well 
conceive how the rough " navvies " might be quite 
carried away with her ; for there is nothing in her 
looks or conversation that bespeaks the straigbt- 
laced religionist, but rather the noble and accom- 
plished Christian lady. 

I do not feel at liberty to trespass further in de- 
scribing the frank courtesy which took me immedi- 
ately into the family circle, nor the very pleasant 
hour I spent, especially in conversation with her 
father Dr. Marsh, whose venerable face might be 
truly called " a perpetual benediction." The 
widow of the hero of " Victory Won " was making 
a visit in Beckenham at the same time, and she 
was put under my escort back to London. She 
told me that Miss Marsh was a true friend, and 
that " when she once became interested in one's 
welfare, she never left that person till the good she 
strove for was accomplished." It was easy enough 
to see where her power lay. It is in her perfect 
trust — her great-souled confidence in God and 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 307 

man. She believes that sympathy shown to any 
human being will meet some return, and will afford 
some standing-place, some opportunity of good. 
To a masculine will she unites a true woman's 
heart, and both are consecrated to the work of edu- 
cating and raising up the forsaken classes of society. 
She leads this " forlorn hope " with a cheerful 
courage that should inspire imitation. She is the 
Florence Nightingale to the religious wants of poor 
soldiers and seamen. She showed me the method 
in which she kept the accounts, or acted as Savings 
Bank, for hundreds of these people. These two 
noble women were the ensamples of our own 
American and Christian Commission ladies during 
the war, and they are only worthy of more honor, 
not that they have done more, but because they 
were first in the work. 

I am now going to take my reader a little fur- 
ther down into the county of Hampshire, or Hants. 
With a letter of introduction quite unexpectedly 
put in my hands to the " Rector of Eversley," 
which offered a temptation I could not resist, I 
sought out on the map of the county the point 
called Eversley. To get at it one leaves the 
railroad at the Winchfield Station, on the South- 
western Railway. Here I hired a carriage and 
drove some twelve miles over the sandy moor- 
lands, skirting around the village of Hartley Wint- 
ney. The last part of the way was through a wil- 
derness of blooming heather. It was one sea of 
purple flowers as far as the eye could reach, and 



308 OLD ENGLAND. 

the ride through it was exhilarating. It was, if I 
mistake not, the common " ling " with bell-shaped 
blossoms, quite fragrant, and the delight of the 
honey-bee. In the midst of this purple waste, 
down in a little hollow, was the " Rector of Evers- 
ley's " house ; and near by, almost in the garden, 
was his church ; and they formed the only village 
that I could see. 

Charles Kingsley's home was the very picture of 
a rural parsonage, or poet's dwelling, away from 
noise and men. The garden and lawn were orna- 
mental without being stiff, and the windows and 
walls were smothered in luxuriant vines and roses. 
All the apartments and bow-windows stood open, 
and there seemed to be a free communication with 
out-door Nature. The birds might sing through 
and in the house. Unfortunately the master of 
this pleasant house was away. I was hospitably 
entertained in Mr. Kingsley's own study, which was 
indeed next to seeing himself. I could not help 
glancing around the room — might I say " den " ? 
Some stalwart old folios of the " Fathers " looked 
like the rough bark out of which the honey of 
" Hypatia " and other books of exquisite flavor 
and spiritual richness had been drawn. There 
appeared to be a good collection of historical works, 
and the whole, as far as I could read at a glance, 
formed an interesting and rare library — just the 
one that awakened the appetite to look and search 
further. An oak fragment of one of the ships of 
the Spanish Armada hung over the fireplace. 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 309 

Pipes were not wanting and walking-sticks — but 
enough of this raiding upon a man's private domin- 
ions in his absence ! 

Kingsley is still what may be called a young 
man, as are indeed many of those living authors 
such as Ruskin and Matthew Arnold, who have 
breathed new freedom and power into English lit- 
erature. He was born at Holne Vicarage on the 
borders of Dartmoor in Devonshire, and was at 
one time a pupil of Derwent Coleridge. The spirit 
of freedom has long lived in his family. The 
Kingsleys of Cheshire were noted for their fidelity 
to the Parliament in the civil wars, and one branch 
of the family emigrated to America, from whom 
the late Professor Kingsley, of Yale College, was a 
descendant. A relative of Froude the historian, 
he has perhaps thereby been brought in contact 
with the new and independent ideas of English 
History, of which he forms as it were the prophet 
or poet. And whatever may be thought by some 
of his theological shortcomings, as the ardent 
champion of his friend Maurice, he has vigorously 
striven to carry Christianity into practical life, and 
to infuse its higher spirit into the very framework 
of society. He has advocated a religion which 
has warm blood in it, and can feel, think, run, 
and work. He considers religion, in the words 
of an old English divine, as " the seed of a deified 
nature." Let us hope that he may never be faith- 
less to his principles, as some of his latest utter- 
ances awaken the fear of his being. He must 



310 OLD ENGLAND. 

deny himself in an unscrupulous and bad sense to 
become a defender of injustice, or of power against 
the poor. If he do this, notwithstanding a great 
enthusiasm for him, he may go to the shades where, 
alas ! many dead heroes have gone before him. 
This is indeed a small threat as far as myself is 
concerned, but, if I mistake not, it will also be the 
united judgment of an American public opinion 
which has heretofore passionately honored and 
loved Kingsley, and the entire loss of whose favor, 
which has been called an English author's verdict 
of posterity, no man living, be he ever so great, 
can well afford to suffer. 

I went into the plain, old-fashioned church where 
Mr. Kingsley then ministered to his humble congre- 
gation. A young relative of his told me that his 
congregation was chiefly composed of laboring peo- 
ple, " clod-hoppers," as he called them. " But," he 
added, "he manages to interest them wonderfully." 
He said that young officers from the camp of Al- 
dershott, a few miles distant, were in the habit of 
riding over to hear Mr. Kingsley. They probably 
recognized the true fighter in him — the true " sol- 
dier-priest." 

To turn to another topic. The people of Europe 
may be divided into two classes, those who drink 
wine, and those who drink beer. The Englishman 
vies with the German in his insatiable love of beer. 
Its small fountains are spouting night and day in 
town and country. Our friend Gough thinks that 
they are fountains of unadulterated evil, but that 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 311 

Englishman is poor indeed who cannot have his 
mug of ale at dinner. Three fine counties, Kent, 
Sussex, and Surrey, are almost entirely devoted to 
the raising of hops. In Nottingham hops are also 
grown, but they are of a weaker flavor. There js 
no prettier sight than an English hop-garden with 
its festooned and flowing vines, its narrow lanes, 
and checkered lights. It is far more beautiful than 
a cropped vineyard of France or Germany. And 
the numberless little neat white drying-houses with 
their red-tiled pointed towers, and crane-like 
wooden flues or chimneys for carrying off the reek 
of the hops, are not unpicturesque. The drying 
process lasts from eight to ten hours. Fuel that is 
smokeless or nearly so must be used. The pick- 
ing commences when the flower is of a straw-color 
turning to brown. During the hop harvest in 
September there is a merry time throughout the 
length and breadth of these counties. It is sober 
England turned stroller and gypsy. Men, women, 
and children, beggars, strangers, Irishmen, Scotch- 
men, Welchmen, and poor London people, stream 
into the hop districts and gather the harvest, sleep- 
ins mostlv out on the fields in tents. But the hop 
is the most precarious of crops, and fortunes are 
annually lost and won in its delicate speculations. 
The very abundance of the harvest sometimes de- 
stroys its value ; the duty upon hops is extremely 
heavy, and as the hop raisers declare, very unjust. 
It is laid upon the amount produced, instead of by 
the acre or ad valorem; so that the producer in 



312 OLD ENGLAND. 

one county may raise more and get less, than one 
in another county who raises less in quantity but 
better in quality. The total number of acres under 
the cultivation of hops is said to be not far from 
fifty thousand, the region of Rochester raising the 
largest crop, and that of Canterbury the next 
largest. The queen of the hop-rearing districts 
and the royal city of Kent, is Canterbury, fifty-six 
miles from London and seven from the sea-shore. 
It is a place now of some 15,000 inhabitants. Its 
Saxon name was Cantwarabyrig, or " city of the 
men of Kent." It is said to be older than Rome, 
and at the time of the Conquest it contained more 
inhabitants than London. Truly a fair sight it is, 
lying " compact together " in the vale of the Stour, 
with a circle of picturesque windmills standing 
around it on the low hills, and engirt by its hop 
gardens and trees, its antique buildings, and the 
cathedral rising from its bosom like a very " city of 
God." It is an English Damascus for situation. 
What multitudes of pilgrims once poured into it to 
visit the shrine of a Becket ! There was the seat 
of the missionary operations of Augustine, the 
apostle of England. " Watling Street " of the 
Romans which traversed England, the English 
Appian Way, ran through Canterbury, and here 
still retains its ancient name. But one of the old 
gates of Canterbury, that called " Westgate," re- 
mains standing by the puny black stream of the 
Stour, and forms a narrow arched entrance be- 
tween two formidable and battlemented round 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 313 

towers, reminding one of Hotspur's gate at Aln- 
wick. In the little lane called " Le Mercerie," 
leading up to the Cathedral from High Street, was 
situated the " Tabard Inn," sometimes called 
" Chequers Inn," where the Canterbury pilgrims 
rested. 

The Cathedral is a gray pile, with an elegant 
central tower called " The Angel Tower," two 
hundred and eighty-five feet high ; the porch is an 
exquisite specimen of the Perpendicular Style, and 
over its door was formerly carved the scene of 
Thomas a Becket's assassination. The spot where 
this event occurred was in the north cross aisle at 
the end of the nave, and this part of the church 
bears the name of " The Martyrdom." The im- 
perious prelate died with dignity, — 

" darkening with his blood 
The monument of holy Theobald." * 

The day of his death, the 29th of December, 1170, 
was long held sacred by the Papal Church in Eng- 
land. His shrine in Trinity Chapel behind the 
screen of the high altar, which became from the 
gifts of innumerable pilgrims one of the richest in 
the world, has been removed for centuries, but the 
stone steps which ascended to it, worn deep by the 
feet of myriad votaries, are still to be seen. One is 
also shown the spot from which a small square 
piece of stone stained with Becket's blood was cut 
out and sent to Rome. The penance and flagella- 
tion of the haughty Henry II., showing the power 

1 Thomas a BecJcet — a Tragedy by G. H. Hollister. 



314 OLD ENGLAND. 

of Rome at that age, took place in the " Chapter- 
house " of the Cathedral. 

From the fact, perhaps, that Edward the Black 
Prince was buried in this church, it has become 
an English " Valhalla " or " Temple of Heroes." 
The tomb of the hero is in an excellent state of 
preservation. The bronze effigy of the Prince, 
once highly gilded and of fine workmanship, repre- 
sents him as a young man of graceful form and 
regular, even delicate features. The helm, shield, 
surcoat, and gauntlets that he wore on the field of 
Cressy, are suspended over the tomb. The helm 
is surmounted by a bronze lion, with stiff brand- 
ished tail and open mouth. One of the old chron- 
iclers of England wrote thus in his quaint way of 
the death of the Black Prince : "His deth bare 
awey with it all the sikernes (security) of the 
land." There are also modern monuments to Eng- 
lish soldiers slain in Holland, Belgium, Portugal, 
Spain, India, and the fights at Moodku, Sobraon, 
and Abwal. The church is hung with torn flags 
that have passed through the fierce fires of Eng- 
land's battles. In the undercroft of the Cathedral 
a small remnant of the ancient church of French 
Walloons, driven away by persecution from their 
native land in Elizabeth's reign, still worship. This 
subterranean chapel was granted to them by Eliza- 
beth as a place of worship. They continued to be 
silk weavers, and in the time of Charles II. were 
the most important silk manufacturers in England. 
This Cathedral is an exhaustless mine for the 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 315 

architectural student, as it was the royal shrine of 
English faith for so many centuries, and was orna- 
mented, added to, and enriched by so many kings, 
whether moved to do so by piety or remorse. King 
Edward I. and Margaret were married in 1299 at 
the altar of the "Martyrdom." Edward the Black 
Prince died in the Archiepiscopal house in Palace 
Street near by. Fragments of history of every 
age crop out, from the deep and extensive crypt 
whose foundations were laid in Saxon times, to the 
new windows that are the production of the latest 
modern English Art. The bit of Norman staircase, 
with four heavy pillars, round-headed arches with 
the chevron ornament, and an open arcade at the 
northwest angle of the Priory, is an extremely 
interesting feature of the past. The armed feet 
of the warlike Edward III. and of the " Black 
Prince " might often have trodden it, and it looks 
now, with its ponderous columns and angles, in 
perfect keeping with those dark and mail-clad 
forms. 

A Missionary College has been founded upon the 
site of the Abbey and the residence of Augustine, 
and has incorporated within its buildings some parts 
of the old edifice, especially two gateways, and a 
fine old arch. The ancient work is mostly of flint 
rubble, which is a kind of building material now 
extensively used all along through the chalk dis- 
tricts. This was the " Augustine " sent by Pope 
Gregory, of whom the familiar story of seeing the 
English youth in the slave-market of Rome is 
told. 



316 OLD ENGLAND. 

A purer Christianity had been sown in England 
long before, and had its precarious abode among 
the mountains of Wales and along the western 
shores of the island ; but Augustine, partly by 
persuasion and partly by force, succeeded in bring- 
ing all under his spiritual sway, and by degrees 
also won over the warlike Saxon kings and their 
people to a nominal acceptance of the Christian 
faith. Ethelbert, King of Kent in 596, was the 
first to receive the new religion, and upon the site 
of his palace Canterbury Cathedral stands. The 
chair in which the ancient Kings of Kent were 
crowned is preserved in the church. From this 
spot therefore, even though feebly and mistily, our 
own faith sprang. As much as we may abhor the 
errors of the Romish Church, we cannot forget 
that it was through her hands we ourselves have 
received the Word of Life. The procession of 
monks from Rome entered the heathen city where 
the temples of stormy Thor and wanton Friga 
stood, bearing a silver cross and chanting the sol- 
emn old Latin words, " Deprecamur te Domine in 
omnia miserecordi& ut auferatur furor tuus." 

The list of ancient charities of the city of Can- 
terbury is a curious one. One of them is a bene- 
faction producing an annual income of <£37 5s., to 
provide gowns of russet cloth for poor persons 
above fifty years of age, residing in certain parishes 
of the city ; another is a gift of <£100, every £5 
of the interest of which sum is to be appropriated 
to setting up some young man in trade who has 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 317 

served an apprenticeship of seven years ; another 
is a yearly rent of but eleven shillings. 

While at the Fountains Inn, the landlord insisted 
upon my hearing the famous " Canterbury Catch 
Club," which has been established for about a 
century. It was an odd scene, rivaling a German 
student's beer-cellar. A large room handsomely 
frescoed in blue and gold was arranged with long 
mahogany tables, at which companies of gentlemen 
old and young sat, each with a tall mug of ale 
before him and a long white clay pipe. Through 
the thick volumes of smoke appeared also a speak- 
er's desk, and a raised platform at one end of the 
apartment where the singers and the musicians sat. 
I was invited to a seat by the side of a ruddy-faced 
Canterbury burgher, who gave me a minute history 
of the club and its trials with democratic foes, and 
furnished me with a good deal of gossip about city 
matters, hop speculations, beer making, etc. The 
ladies occupied an adjoining apartment with an 
open door between, and they must have enjoyed 
with the music a powerful flavor of smoke during 
" the ambrosial evening." There were some brass 
instruments, but the chief entertainment was song- 
singing, and if ever I heard true melody, such as 
makes the heart leap and the eye sparkle, it was 
there. The old historic glee of " Queen Bess " 
was given in fine round style, and the national 
piece called " The British Isles," with five parts, 
touched a chord in every heart. Some sweet Eng- 
lish airs full of tenderness were sung with manly 



318 OLD ENGLAND. 

feeling ; but the gem of the evening was Shak- 
speare's majestic lines sung in six voices : — 

" The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
Yea all which it inherits shall dissolve, 
And like this unsubstantial pageant faded, 
Leave not a rack behind." 

Voice followed voice, solemn and rich, as if they 
were building up together in harmony these glori- 
ous fabrics, and then interweaving and dying away 
in plaintive tones like the wind that sweeps over 
the ruins of a desert city. The whole evening 
was so thoroughly racy, hearty, and English, that 
I could almost forgive the stupefying beer and acrid 
tobacco smoke. He who says the English have- no 
music in them should hear one of these national 
" Catch Clubs." 

It is a dull, long, lonely ride between Canterbury 
and Dover, sixteen miles over the chalk hills, with 
now and then a dirty, boozy, drinking inn. The 
names of English road-side inns, such as the " Bar- 
ley Mow," the "Red Cow," the "Pack Horse," 
the " Malt Shovel," etc., have the true smack of 
rural England. Sitting on the outside of the coach 
I was amused by the conversation of two young 
Londoners, with round hats, checked clothes, and 
eye-glasses, upon the comparative merits of Lon- 
don theatres. Their pronunciation particularly 
attracted me as being the broadest type of Punch's 
utterances of this class of youth. As a general 
thing I do not altogether dislike the English man- 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 319 

ner of speaking, notwithstanding its " stomachic " 
tones. It has a manliness, richness, and breadth 
of light and shade, that our sharp flat pronuncia- 
tion lacks. It does not dwell upon the short vow- 
els as Americans are apt to do, but touches them 
lightly. Yet when English pronunciation is pushed 
to an extreme, now gurgling thick as Devonshire 
cream, and now running up and down the gamut 
in extraordinarily high and low tones, it is any 
thing but harmonious or intelligible. There are, it 
is true, very decided differences of pronunciation 
among educated men in England and in America, 
— who are right? We should think that the older 
nation would retain the right standard, but it 
would be difficult for us to say " primer," and " in- 
spiration," as they say them in Oxford ; or " fer- 
tile " and " e-vil ; " or " rather " and " Sarah ; " 
or " Iron Juke " and " Tchudor architecture." 
Pronunciation is so arbitrary a thing, however, that 
one need not be alarmed if he sometimes differs 
from another educated person, especially from one 
across the water. Americans, I contend, have a 
superior clearness of articulation, but with our 
tendency to lay stress on unaccented syllables, 
and our flat pronunciation of the vowels, we may 
learn something from the trippingly talking Eng- 
lishman. 

We are now going over a portion of that great 
chalk region of England, which extends north 
through nearly the whole of the counties of Suffolk 
and Norfolk, and south through large portions of 



320 OLD ENGLAND. 

Sussex, Hants, Wilts, and Dorset counties, and is 
seen also in the Isle of Wight. It marks and 
paints itself in the scenery with its more tranquil 
and gently undulating hills and vales, rising higher 
toward the sea-coast, and breaking off in bold cliffs, 
as at Dover and Folkestone. Patches of snow- 
white chalk rock gleam out here and there from 
the summits and sides of the green hills, like the 
white Southdown sheep that feed upon them ; and 
they are as different from the black slate shelves 
of Wales as if it were another world. The in- 
tensely green and white colors form a fine contrast. 
Geologists tell us that we are treading here upon 
the bed of a primitive ocean, formed by the accu- 
mulation of minute crustaceous and marine ani- 
mals. This was all life once. When we look up 
we are lost in the greatness of the celestial uni- 
verse, whose edges only we have feebly explored, 
and when we look under our feet we are lost in the 
infinity of the minute ; and both bear equal evi- 
dence to the inconceivable extent of the Past, and 
to the truth that their Author is " from everlasting 
to everlasting." 

In the calcareous rock are found those colossal 
mammals and quadrupeds of the British Museum, 
those mountains of bones, vastly excelling in size 
the sculptured bulls of Nineveh. 

Here in the neighborhood of Dover began that 
famous Roman road of which we have alreadv 
spoken, called " Watling Street," and which the 
traveler often comes across in his journey ings 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 321 

through the midland counties. It ran through 
Kent over the Thames by London ; on by St. Al- 
bans and Stratford ; along the Severn by Worces- 
ter ; and then through the middle of Wales to 
Caradigan on the Irish Channel. Nothing by 
halves, was the Roman motto. What a concep- 
tion one gets of the power of ancient Rome to find 
her roads, viaducts, bridges, arches, baths, citadels, 
standing in the midst of totally dissimilar and far- 
distant regions, like England, Northern Germany, 
Syria, and the wastes of Africa. Her rule in Brit- 
ain was on the whole beneficial, and she taught 
the painted barbarians of " The Little Island " 
their first grand lesson in civilization — the idea of 
Law. 

Dover has little to interest with the exception of 
its castle, which stands upon a high rock to the 
east of the town, and covers some thirty-five acres 
with its buildings of Roman, Saxon, Norman, and 
modern architecture. As the principal of the 
" Cinque Ports," and as the great outlet to the 
Continent, and more than all as one of the few 
places of safety along that sweep of dangerous 
coast, Dover will always be important. And even 
this is a precarious . haven. The immense works 
now going on for the improvement of the harbor, 
so that fleets may ride in safety in it, are very 
slowly progressing. Another generation may en- 
joy their advantages. It is a mighty submarine 
battle with shifting sands, and an external one with 
winter storms. When finished, this " harbor of ref- 

21 



322 OLD ENGLAND. 

uge " will embrace an area of 760 acres, surround- 
ed by a wall more than two miles in length, and 
securing a depth of 30 or 40 feet of water at low 
tide. 

These oreat white cliffs of Dover, covered with 
fierce barbarians, presented a formidable sight to 
the galleys of Caesar, as they sailed slowly by to 
find a difficult landing-place a little farther north at 
Deal. In those times the water came up to the 
foot of the cliffs, and the port of Dover was at the 
mouth of the Dour Valley, on the north of the 
city, extending as far as Charlton, and which is 
now filled up. Coming into Dover Harbor in a 
dark night the lines of lights upon the lofty heights, 
the bright lights of the Castle, and the brilliant 
beacons along the towering cliffs, have a singular 
effect ; they seem as if written on the face of the 
sky. The town stands chiefly upon a strip of soil 
formed under the cliffs, and is mostly composed of 
one long street. It has broken an outlet for itself 
from its confined prison-house on the ocean, right 
through the hills that surround it. The double 
tunnel under Shakspeare's Cliff, for the passage of 
the South Eastern Railroad, more than three quar- 
ters of a mile long, is a stupendous work. From 
the soft and crumbling nature of the chalk rock, its 
cutting was a perilous and often disastrous opera- 
tion. And there are seven other tunnels on this 
line, some of them still more difficult and extended. 
" Shakspeare's Cliff " is not so high as it was in 
the poet's time, and its base has receded from the 



LONDON TO FOLKESTONE. 323 

water. From its form, sloping inward, and an- 
swering perfectly to the words of Edgar, — 

" There is a cliff whose high and bending head," &e., 

every fragment that falls from the edge lessens its 
height. In walking up it I roused a host of little 
birds, making the air melodious with their morn- 
ing songs. From the top of the cliff I counted 
one hundred and twenty sail, and saw the coast of 
France distinctly, although the day was dusky. It 
is twenty-one miles across. The time was when 
this England was thought to be a mere appendage 
to yonder coast by its Norman kings. The view 
toward Folkestone has something wild and solemn 
in it. The white cliffs solitary and stern, gleaming 
pale under the sombre sky, look like resolute and 
thoughtful sentinels watching the opposite hostile 
coast, the giant guardians of freedom. 

Folkestone, six miles from Dover, is soon reached 
upon the railway. It has been greatly improved, 
purified, and beautified, since it has become the 
chief point of communication with Boulogne, a sail 
of an hour and a half. Here, as at Dover, one 
sees the genuine English sailor such as France 
cannot grow. He u smacks of the wild Norwegian 
still," and has an impudent, independent swagger, 
but stands on the deck firm as a rock, and carries 
a calm eye and ruddy cheek. 

The " Pavilion Hotel " at Folkestone is a most 
comfortable and ample house. The aristocratic 
town stands above on the heights. The grassy 
edge of the cliff forms a beautiful promenade. 



324 OLD ENGLAND. 

Not far from Folkestone to the south are Hythe, 
Romney, and Hastings, — three other towns of the 
Cinque Ports, — 

" Sandwich and Komney, Hastings, Hythe and Dover, 
Were all alert that day." 

Seven miles from Hastings is " Battle Abbey," the 
remains of that proud structure built by William 
the Conqueror on the field of Hastings, over the 
spot where Harold fell. It was also upon these 
shores that our free-roving ancestors, the rough, 
big, blue-eyed Saxons, .swarmed in upon Eng- 
land. At " the Isle of Thanet," near Margate, 
landed the first Saxon invaders. Craftily obtain- 
ing possession of but just as much land as a bull's 
hide would go around, with true Anglo-Saxon 
acquisitiveness they finally overran and conquered 
the whole island. The same old viking spirit of 
the lust of power and possession has manifested it- 
self in the whole course of English history, in the 
harrying of Scotland, the oppression of Ireland, and 
the unprincipled conquest of India ; and it has 
cropped out in the New "World in the policy of the 
United States toward the American Indian, and 
in the system of American Slavery. But let us be 
thankful that the spark of a nobler spirit was also 
sown with this inborn piratical instinct — the spark 
of the love of liberty — which though long tying la- 
tent finally breaks out and burns up what is base 
and material. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 

Tunbridge Junction on the South Eastern 
Railway is just half way between Folkestone and 
London ; and by a branch line of five miles one 
comes to Tunbridge Wells. Seated in the garden 
of Kent, on the brow of a hill overlooking a broad 
and gentle vale, is this old and popular watering- 
place. Its thymy and healthy moors strewn with 
singular masses of isolated rock, its luxuriant hop- 
vines, its chalybeate spring, and above all its union 
of pastoral beauty with the comforts and elegancies 
of a handsome town, will always make it a Javorite 
English health resort, to those who can bear the 
rough breezes of the English Channel. 

The sandstone rocks of Tunbridge Wells form a 
part of that remarkable geologic feature called 
" The Wealden Beds." They are a superficial 
stratum of clay, sandstone, limestone, and ironstone, 
formed over and around the great chalk-bed of this 
region. They extend over large portions of Kent 
and Sussex, and reach even to the coast of France. 
From petrified forests, and characteristic fossil re- 
mains found in the " Wealden," it is inferred that 
these strata were a fresh - water deposit. Here 



326 OLD ENGLAND. 

was once the vast estuary of a British Amazon two 
hundred miles wide, flowing from interior moun- 
tains before the British Channel was scooped out. 
It is conjectured that on the subsidence of the 
waters, those odd columnar masses known as the 
" Harrison," " Eridge," " Rusthall," and " Toad " 
rocks, were left standing, and being soft stone have 
been worn into their present grotesque shapes by 
the action of time and weather. The " Wealden " 
is said to grow the finest oaks for ship-timber that 
are to be found in England. 

Brighton, in Sussex County, the queen of all 
English watering-places, is fifty-one miles by rail 
from London. I made the journey during a vio- 
lent October tempest, when at times the stout 
English locomotive could hardly make head against 
the fierce blasts of wind, rain, and hail. At the 
hotel I was put in a room very high up, " be- 
cause," said the landlady, " it was the height of the 
season." The windows rattled and the house shook. 
It was one of those storms that strew the coast 
of England with wrecks. • I myself counted one 
hundred and five wrecks from that one storm re- 
ported in the English papers, — how many more 
there were I know not. But the next morning 
the pier at Brighton presented a sublime sight. 
Although the wind was still so furious that it was 
difficult to walk or drive, hundreds of bold ladies 
w T ere gathered on the sea-walk to witness the ef- 
fects of the storm. No ship was in sight, and as 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 327 

far as could be seen there was one wild gray chaos 
of waters, with now and then a bright light break- 
ing through the coal-black storm-clouds, and illu- 
mining a spot far out on the sombre and angry 
waste. Every billow made a clean sweep over the 
graceful chain-bridge of the " New Pier," twisting 
and rending away its supports. What gigantic in- 
rolling arches and fountains of foam, that, as they 
leaped on high, were scattered by the wind like a 
driving snow-blast ! An old fisherman told me 
that there had not been such a storm since the 
Pilgrim was wrecked. Opposite Kemp-town men 
were occupied in securing casks, bales, and boxes, 
that came ashore from a Mediterranean trading- 
vessel, which had been thrown on the chalk cliffs a 
few miles distant. The cliffs stretching north even 
to Beachy Head looked most formidable, and woe 
to the craft that was then flung upon their white 
teeth. 

Yet ladies reclinino; on sofas at the windows of 
their hotels, while they sipped their coffee at break- 
fast, might look directly out over this fierce marine 
view. For three miles there is a noble drive and 
sea-wall, lined with splendid mansions, hotels, and 
boarding-houses, adapted for winter residence. 
Brighton, notwithstanding its sea-exposure, is a 
comparatively warm and agreeable winter resort. 
It is, in the summer months, a city of nearly 100,- 
000 inhabitants. The smooth undulating Downs 
above the town not only produce delicate mutton, 
but are fine fields for walking and horseback exer- 



328 OLD ENGLAND. 

cise. The " Pavilion," with its puerile domes 
and minarets, recalls the false and flimsy epoch 
of that semi-Oriental monarch, George IV. His 
statue by Chantrey stands upon a promenade called 
the " Old Steine." The house of Mrs. Thrale, 
where Dr. Johnson visited, is still standing. The 
atmosphere of Brighton is considered to be verv 
favorable for invalids in the winter time, as well 
as the summer. Dr. Kebbell, in a book upon 
"The Climate of Brighton" says of it: " The mild- 
ness, and particularly the equableness, of the at- 
mosphere, and its freedom from all malarious ex- 
halations, together with the choice it offers in the 
difference of temperature between its sheltered and 
exposed situations, all combine in rendering Brigh- 
ton a very desirable place of residence during the 
winter months, and suitable in the great majority 
of diseases for which sea-air is found to be service- 
able. To define the winter climate of Brighton in 
a few words I should use the terms mild, equable, 
dry, and bracing; though in this latter quality it 
varies considerably in its different situations. I 
should say that the more sheltered parts of Brigh- 
ton cannot differ very materially in the general 
properties of their climate from some of the more 
elevated portions of Ventnor. The sea-side places 
on the southwest coast, as Torquay and Penzance, 
owing to their more westerly position, have both a 
milder and more equable winter climate than 
Brighton, or any other place on the south coast ; 
but they are at the same time more relaxing, ener- 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 329 

vating, and humid — qualities of climate which cer- 
tainly agree better with some constitutions, and are 
particularly well suited for a large class of pulmo- 
nary complaints. But the impression is certainly 
now rapidly gaining ground that the drier and 
more bracing climates of the south coast are, on the 
whole, more conducive to health, as well as more 
suitable to the great majority of invalids, including 
many chest affections, and even some forms of pul- 
monary consumption, for which not long since the 
southwest climates were invariably prescribed." 

How often one spirit seems to take possession of 
a place, and to pervade it like a divinity, so that 
every thing else in the place is known or brought 
into prominence simply by its relations to that spirit. 
We at a distance know Brighton as the home of 
P. W. Robertson ; though doubtless thousands in 
Brighton would be surprised at this, or, it may be, 
would sneer at it. But, more than any thing else 
Brighton is interesting to us, because here so great 
a part of his life-battle was fought. These clay 
cliffs have light on them, because his feet trod 
them, and this ocean view is glorious because his 
wearied mind was so often refreshed by it. In the 
pulpit of Trinity Chapel he preached those match- 
less sermons which are almost perfect in form, and 
are perhaps the best expression of the modern type 
of finished, pulpit oratory. It is a singular fact 
that he who would not, as a matter of principle, 
say any thing that he thought would be popular, 
was one of the most popular preachers of the times. 



830 OLD ENGLAND. 

The scene at his funeral, when fifteen hundred 
working men followed his remains to the grave, and 
the whole city spontaneously put on mourning, Was 
a burial that no king could hope for. Yet his 
power was not altogether inborn or accidental ; it 
was in part the result of thorough culture. He 
who, other things being equal, would rival him as 
a preacher, must go through his training. His ser- 
mons have a unity, a depth, an individuality of 
thought, that could come but from the severest dis- 
cipline. Added to this, his aesthetic sense, his 
poet's love of Nature, his exquisite mastery of lan- 
guage, in which " the word is born w T ith the 
thought," and his intense realization of truth — his 
self-absorption in it — made a combination of won- 
drous power. He w r ho makes abstract things sim- 
ple, and spiritual things plain, will have hearers 
enough. He will speak to the world. Robertson 
is another proof that the highest culture, the truest 
art, instead of unfitting a man to be a preacher 
to all minds, to the unlettered as well as educated, 
only fits him the better for it. It is the man who 
is half trained who never gets to the depths of a 
subject, nor the depths of a heart. He spoke some 
things that will not chime with the orthodoxy of 
the ao-es, and that are too inconsistent to entitle 
him to be a sure guide in theology, but if he spoke 
boldly he w T as ready to suffer; and as a man who 
had drunk into the spirit of self-sacrifice, who 
seized upon the central truth of Christ as the life 
of the soul, who followed his Divine Lord through 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 331 

life and death, and whose earnest words came out 
of the white heat of his own soul's strife and agony 
— for these things, all true men in all Christian 
lands will love him. Robertson's life is sad to read, 
though one " with a kingly sorrow crowned." He 
has found, in his own words, " Rest in God and 
Love : deep repose in that country where the mys- 
tery of this strange life is solved, and the most 
feverish heart lays down its load at last." 

Venerable Winchester, on the way to South- 
ampton, in the county of Hants, overlooking the 
beautiful vale of the Itchen, is worthy of a longer 
description than I can give it. It was Alfred's 
home, and was an old British city even before his 
day. It has played a royal part in all the early 
history of England, especially during the Norman 
period. In its ancient cathedral, Egbert the first 
Saxon king, Richard I., and three other English 
monarchs, were crowned. The dust of Alfred, 
Egbert, Canute, and William Rufus, sleeps here. 
Tne remains of many Saxon princes have been 
gathered into six small chests, or coffers, and placed 
in the choir. Winchester is the chief seat and 
home of that great genius, William of Wykeham ; 
the west front of the Cathedral, with its noble 
perpendicular window, and also the magnificent 
nave, are his handiwork. No English Cathedral 
has a more impressive and beautiful interior than 
Winchester, though its exterior is low and austere ; 
the amount of exquisite carved flower-work in this 
church I have before hinted at. The tomb and 



332 OLD ENGLAND. 

painted effigy of its greatest builder, William of 
Wykeham, is quite perfect, and represents him as a 
fresh-faced benignant looking man. The capped 
effigy of Cardinal Beaufort is in the presbytery, 
in which he is represented as having a Norman 
nose and high proud face. Shakspeare says " He 
died and made no sign ; " and one cannot help 
thinking in contrast of the death of the stern but 
just Scotch reformer, as related by Carlyle : 
" ' Hast thou hope ? ' they asked of John Knox 
when he lay a-dying. He spake nothing, but 
raised his finger and pointed upward, and so he 
died." 

Gentle Izaak Walton's remains also rest here. 
He lived in Winchester with his son-in-law until 
he was ninety years old. Dr. Arnold was a scholar 
of Winchester School, which is the oldest in the 
kingdom. 

From Winchester I went to Portsmouth, a 
wholly different scene, with its dirty crowded 
streets and busy dockyards. Hiring two old mot- 
tle-faced " salts," I took a row in the lake-like 
basin of the harbor, though the waves were still 
rolling and tossing uncomfortably, so that when we 
put up sail and plowed across the harbor, we had 
a plentiful shower-bath of salt water. We passed 
the old Bellerophon^ now rotting by the wharf. 
She looks small and stubbed by the side of those 
vast " three-deckers " that lie around in the harbor 
like chained sea-lions, and which are in fact like 
lions with their fangs pulled out. " Yankee cheese- 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 338 

boxes on rafts " have drawn the fire from these old 
thunderers. The Victory also lies here, and is 
crowded with chubby-cheeked, bright eyed naval 
apprentices. Though made over almost entirely, 
something of the ancient vessel still remains, es- 
pecially in the lower parts. One is shown the spot 
where Nelson fell, and the " cock-pit " where he 
died. 

At Spithead, just outside of the harbor, where 
the Royal Greorge went down, is the chief ren- 
dezvous of the British Navy. It is protected 
from violent w r inds by the Isle of Wight and the 
main land. These great inland channels made by 
the Isle of Wight, Spithead, the Solent, and South- 
hampton water, these free yet broad and sheltered 
anchorages, give to this point of the English coast 
its naval preeminence. Here is its naval arsenal. 
Not obtaining admission to the dockyards which 
form the principal object of interest in Portsmouth, 
covering some one hundred and twenty acres, and 
separated from the city by a wall fourteen feet high, 
I will go on to Southampton. 

The ride of eighteen miles is for the first part 
of the way along the shore of the inner harbor, and 
affords one a view of the fine ruins of Porchester 
Castle. I had here a second specimen of an oscil- 
lating car, which jolted out many rough sayings 
from the sea-faring passengers. 

At Southampton the most striking object is a 
piece of the old feudal wall looking sea-ward, — a 
grand fragment. Southampton has almost the as- 



334 OLD ENGLAND. 

pect of a new American town, and seems to have a 
great deal of unoccupied ground. In the hall of 
the hotel all sorts of odd-shaped boxes, elaborately 
corded bundles and "packages, marked " Bom- 
bay," " Calcutta," &c, remind one that he stands 
here in the vestibule of the avenue that leads to 
the great Indian Empire. I was told that when a 
steamer for Egypt left Southampton, she would 
often take eight hundred solid boxes of letters, 
such as one sees marked with large capitals in the 
yard of the London Post-office. Southampton was 
the birthplace of Isaac Watts ; and beautiful Netley 
Abbey, one would think, might make poets now. 

The Isle of Wight is a pocket edition of Eng- 
land, — an epitome, a compact gem, of all Eng- 
land's beauties of rolling hills, quiet valleys, em- 
erald meadows, hedgy lanes, broken cliffs, and 
shaggy ocean bays. I visited the Isle of Wight in 
the month of August, so that this visit forms a 
short episode by itself, and breaks somewhat the 
regular course of my travel southward. In driv- 
ing across the island from Cowes to Sandown Bay, 
we soon lost sight of the tall square campanile of 
the Italian villa of " Osborne House," and after a 
ride of five miles along the Medina River, through 
a bosky wooded country, we came to the old town 
of Newport, the harbor of Carisbrooke. Caris- 
brooke Castle lies about a mile to the north, and 
nearly in the centre of the island. It is perched 
on the summit of a round green hill, and one enters 
it under an archway of Elizabeth's time ; and sure- 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 335 

ly nothing can be more lovely than the marine view 
from its battlements over the tranquil bnt busv 
waters of the Solent. On the left of the gateway 
are the rooms once occupied by Charles I. ; but 
the window from which the king's escape was at- 
tempted is built up. The broken keep still pre- 
sents outwardly a lofty, rugged, defiant aspect; 
while within, a poor little scrubby donkey draw- 
ing up water from the interminable well, was the 
chief amusement at this stronghold, where a rough 
nation put its unsafe sovereign under lock and 
key. 

I went on by the Stan den and St. George's 
Down road to Arreton. The road was deeply cut, 
and on either side was a perfect tangle of thorn 
and bramble ; while riding over some other parts 
of the island the fragrance of the rose and honey- 
suckle was delicious. The Downs here looked 
sere and white, dried up by the heat, although the 
sheep found pretty good pasturage upon them. At 
Arreton I paid a visit to the church where " The 
Dairyman's Daughter " worshiped and was buried. 
It is a plain stone building not unlike Hucknall 
Church, with buttresses to the tower on either side 
of the doorway. Outside in the rude churchyard 
is the tomb of Elizabeth ; and many little bare- 
footed children clustered around as I read the sim- 
ple inscription. The bell on this old tower tolled 
her funeral. The " rich and fruitful valley," now 
rich again with a new harvest, lay beneath with a 
streak of the blue sea in the distance, just as Leigh 



386 OLD ENGLAND. 

Richmond describes it ; and the summer air was as 
mild as then. 

We drove on through a region growing greener 
and more luxuriant to the " Common," as it is 
called, where stands the cottage in which this pious 
maiden lived, who thought religion consisted in 
being " like Christ." Stepping over two bars into 
the pasture, a few steps through the green meadow 
brought us to the small oaken wicket gate (doubt- 
less the same one mentioned in the tract) opening 
into a yard, where a few common bright flowers, 
wild thyme, etc., were growing ; two or three 
tall elms shaded the thatched roof of the cottage, 
and a roughly carved porch was over the doorway. 
A decent intelligent woman welcomed me within, 
where an air of neatness and humble English com- 
fort prevailed. There was the w T ide kitchen fire- 
place, at which doubtless the good minister often 
sat and talked with his young disciple : and I was 
shown the Bible belonging to " The Dairyman's 
Daughter," with some of her writing in it. I 
looked too at the little window of the chamber 
where she died, and where she said that the dark 
valley was not dark because the Lord was there to 
light it. 

In riding on toward Sandown I noticed a copse 
of oak-trees very curiously bent by the south 
wind, so as to form a complete green arch over 
the road. 

The window of the hotel at Sandown looked 
directly out on that wide spreading bay often 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 337 

spoken of by Leigh Richmond, who had something 

of a poet's nature. Shanklin Chine terminated it 

on the south, and white Culver Cliff on the north. 

I gathered fantastic flint pebbles, to fling them into 

the sea again. What sight after all is so fine as a 

great green billow just arching into the sunlight to 

pour itself along the shore ! 

A short distance north of Sandown is Brading ; 

and in the walk from Sandown to Brading one sees 

the scenery through which Leigh Richmond walked, 

in his pastoral labors as Rector of Brading and 

Yaverland. Back of lofty Culver Cliff, which is 

crowned by an awkward and neglected monument 

to Lord Yarborough, lies a broad glistening bay 

almost land-locked, with green hills around, on 

whose steep slopes feed flocks of sheep, and the 

beautiful and rich promontory of Bambridge, where 

Leigh Richmond used to go to teach the people of 

this hamlet, stands at the mouth of this bay. The 

ancient church of Brading, in the valley, is far 

more picturesque than the one at Allerton. It has 

a short spire with a long low body covered with a 

red roof, and terminated by a broader addition or 

ell with three roofs and gable ends, giving the rear 

of the church greater width than the front. A 

conspicuous weather-cock stands upon the low 

spire, as if to remind one of an inscription on one 

of the old tombstones in the yard : " Watch, for 

ye know not when the day of the Lord cometh ; " 

and in this yard is the monument of " The Young 

Cottager," erected by her pastor, which many 
22 



338 OLD ENGLAND. 

ladies, and children, and men also, were looking 
at when I was there. Leigh Richmond made a 
book of instruction for his people out of this an- 
cient churchyard among the hills. This may seem 
strange, but among a rural and primitive people 
the churchyard, usually a green and tranquil spot, 
and the place where the congregation on summer 
Sabbaths spend the interval between the services, 
is no feeble preacher to conscience and heart ; it 
is their " wicket gate " into Immortality. Many 
of the graves were bound over with interlacing 
rose-vine withes. The parsonage, separated from 
the churchyard by a high stone-wall, stands at a 
little distance hid in a wilderness of trees, while 
Bambridge Hill rose steeply to the south speckled 
over with sheep. It was the Sabbath " noon- 
ing." On the old dial in the yard there rested 
no shadow. Groups of clean-dressed villagers sat 
conversing together upon the mossy grave-stones. 
The soft summer wind gently swayed the tops of 
the trees. The rugged church, of great antiquity, 
with weeds and flowers growing out of every 
crevice, stood in strong light and shade ; and on 
this spot, the tradition is, was the first preaching 
of the Word of Life in England. I entered by 
the low west porch into the broad and cool Nor- 
man interior. The arches between the pillars were 
rimmed with red color, otherwise every thing was 
bare and plain. In the high square unpainted 
oaken pews a few people were gathered. The 
u Evening Hymn " was first sung, principally by 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 339 

fresh young voices ; and from the pulpit where 
Leigh Richmond preached, I heard a serious and 
pathetic sermon from the text, " If any man 
would come after me, let him take up his cross 
daily and follow me." The thought " daily " was 
dwelt upon, — the need of self-culture in small 
things, and in common every-day matters. The 
doors were wide open, the mild air stole softly in 
with the sunshine, and one caught glimpses of the 
flowery churchyard and the high swelling green 
hills beyond. 

Before leaving Sandown I traversed Culver 
Cliff, peeping over its fearful perpendicular front, 
and sliding down its steep rolling grassy sides. 

From Sandown I took a ride along the " Under- 
cliff" to Shanklin and Bonchurch, and bevond. 
This " Undercliff," which extends to the " Nee- 
dles," is a breaking down, or as we would say in 
America " caving in," of the high chalk and green 
sand-cliff coast, leaving the sea-line a tumbled in- 
extricable mass of luxuriantly weeded and wooded 
rocky chaos, through which the road winds along, 
sometimes shooting over the high hill-top six or 
seven hundred feet in elevation, sometimes around 
the narrow edge of the cliff, and sometimes down 
on the ocean shore at its base. There is here a 
narrow strip of country lying directly upon the sea 
under the hills, of about seven miles in extent, 
which is another of the great health resorts of Eng- 
land — for it has a Mediterranean climate — of 
which Ventnor is the head point of fashion. The 



340 OLD ENGLAND. 

myrtle and fuschia winter here in the open air. 
The northerly, easterly, and westerly winds do not 
blow here, and it is only open to the soft south 
w T ind blowing over the sea. 

The cottages by the road to and beyond Shank- 
lin were the merest dots of houses, built of flint 
paving-stones, and some of them literally smoth- 
ered in roses. The brass knocker on each front- 
door looked about as big as the house. The reapers 
w r ere in the fields ; the blackberries were ripening ; 
the clover meadows were the richest I have ever 
seen. The smooth green field ran even to the 
edge of the cliff, and men were tying up sheaves 
of wheat on the very rim of the high precipice. 
Looking thus suddenly off from the cliffs upon an 
unlimited ocean horizon, the sky and sea being of 
the same tint, for there was a slight mist in the air, 
and ocean and sky thus mingling mysteriously to- 
gether, with patches here and there of soft hazy 
sunlight on the sea, the effect was strangely beauti- 
ful, — there seemed to be a mystic indefiniteness 
and infinitude to the view. There is a transcend- 
ental passage in Jean Paul Richter's writings 
which conveys something of a similar impression : 
" As the sea, when it is quite stilled and trans- 
parent melts so softly and entirely into the heaven 
which is mirrored in it, that both become arched 
into a globe of sky, so that the ship appears not to 
be borne on the water but hovering in the soft 
ether of the universe." 

Down in little gray old Bonchurch Cemetery, 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 341 

entirely hid from the road, and within sound of the 
gently rippling sea, sleeps John Sterling, the friend 
of Archdeacon Hare and Carlyle ; and here also 
William Adams, the author of " The Shadow of 
the Cross," is buried. Ventnor itself is getting 
to be too grand and town-like for such a little 
" Aiden " as the Isle of Wight ; and the great 
prim English stone villas accord ill with the wild 
verdurous chaos of " Undercliff." 

St. Lawrence Church, a little way beyond Vent- 
nor, is said to be the smallest church edifice in 
England. It has been lately enlarged, and is now 
just twenty feet by twelve, and has held, when 
crammed as full as it could be, one hundred and 
seven people ! One actually looks down on the 
eaves when standing upon the outside of the 
church, which is built on sloping ground. One 
minute window is twelve by eighteen inches ; two 
small stone crosses crown either end, and rough 
beams cross the ceiling which are not even straight, 
resembling the bent oak ribs of a ship. Lord Yar- 
boro's large pew took up about one fourth of the 
interior ; but still it had every thing that belonged 
to a church, even to a painted window. It was a 
Lilliput cathedral ; yet from its high antiquity and 
touching lowliness, it had a certain dignity of its 
own. The view from it is superb over the darkly 
fringed cliff and the broad blue serene ocean. I 
could not carry out my intention to return to the 
Isle of Wight and visit the southern and western 
coasts, the Needles and Scratchell's Bay, where the 



342 OLD ENGLAND. 

scenery is said to be truly magnificent, with the 
pearly-white sharp-edged cliffs towering in great 
isolated masses from the ocean, and in a storm 
looking wan and strangely threatening against the 
gloomy sky. Things there are not upon such a 
miniature scale of prettiness as is the rest of the 
island. 

Near Freshwater Bay, at Farringford, was then 
the residence of Alfred Tennyson. A good oppor- 
tunity had been afforded from a high source of an 
introduction to the poet, which would doubtless 
have secured for me a pleasant reception, but I did 
not avail myself of it. In the case of Maurice and 
Kingsley, and also of Miss Marsh, I had another 
object than personal curiosity ; and the interview 
with old Mr. Bronte at Haworth was also entirely 
unsought by me. It is quite unsatisfactory to 
present letters of introduction in England, and it 
is far better to receive the spontaneous invitation 
of a fellow-traveler, as it was my good fortune to 
do in two or three instances, thus winning for me 
delightful visits to pleasant English homes, where 
every kind of generous hospitality was heaped 
upon me. An American friend who visited Ten- 
nyson about this time told me of his pride in the 
grove of ilex-trees growing near his house, of 
which he speaks in his poems. In his ordinary 
conversation he would be taken for a man of 
science rather than a poet ; for he is an accurate 
student and keen observer in the natural sciences. 



TUNBRIDGE WELLS TO ISLE OF WIGHT. 843 

Although they may be quite familiar, I will repeat 
his lines to Rev. F. D. Maurice : — 

" Where, far from smoke and noise of town, 
I watch the twilight falling brown, 

All round a careless oi'dered garden 

Close to the ridge of a noble down. 
You have no scandal while you dine, 
But honest talk and wholesome wine, 

And only hear the magpie gossip 
Garrulous under a roof of pine. 

For groves of pine on either hand, 
To break the blast of winter, stand ; 
And further on, the hoary channel 
Tumbles a breaker on chalk and sand." 



CHAPTER XIX. 

SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 

In going from Southampton to Salisbury on the 
Southwestern Railway, I stopped for a few hours 
at Romsey, Hants, where is " Broadlands," the 
seat of the late Lord Palmer ston. I wished to 
hunt up some records in the Abbey Church, for 
which I was furnished every facility. The fine 
old church itself is a genuine specimen of the 
early Norman, and it stands in its primitive sim- 
plicity. It struck me as having some architect- 
ural resemblance to Bakewell Church, Derbyshire. 
The sexton grew pathetic over a long tress of 
auburn hair which he had himself exhumed, and 
which he said belonged to Alfred's daughter, or a 
Roman princess, I have forgotten which. I spent 
some time in turning over the ponderous vellum 
church archives ; but it was like looking for the 
grave of Merlin, to find any particular name in 
such a vast unsystematized mass of extinct names. 

Three miles from Romsey is c ' Embley Park," 
the southern home of Florence Nightingale. 

It is a culminating point in one's English travel 
when he catches his first distant sight of Salisbury 
Cathedral. If there is any thing graceful it is the 



SOUTHAMPTOM TO SALISBURY. 345 

spire of Salisbury Cathedral, and above all when it 
is seen etherealized through the misty English at- 
mosphere, which transmutes solid into aerial forms. 
At this season of the year, when the fashionable 
travel was nearly over, and only business men, or, 
as they are termed, " commercial travelers," are 
abroad with their " mackintoshes " and carpet-bags, 
I was doomed to interminable conversations in rail- 
way carriages and coffee-rooms, with hard-brained 
and plain-spoken men. I met among them often- 
times exceedingly well-informed individuals, and if 
one is a little cautious not to arouse national preju- 
dices, there are few more interesting and graphic 
conversationalists than this class of persons. They 
are men who blurt their thoughts out without fear 
or favor. They are practical men, who despise 
humbug and pipe-claying. Louis Napoleon, to be 
sure, was determined to burn and sink England 
before his reign was over ; and thev did not know 
but he could do it, though he would find it a tough 
job ; but, on all other topics, no people are more 
sensible and clear-headed. I fell in with some of 
these men at the " White Hart Inn " in Salisbury. 
They did not spare their national idols, their lead- 
ing men. Even Gladstone, who was one of the 
best of them in their estimation, came in for his 
share ; they called him " a book-man " who knew 
no more of finance than "Boots" here. They 
berated the boarding-houses of London, and in fact 
London trades-people generally, and said that any 
of these would coin his soul for a guinea. This 



346 OLD ENGLAND. 

honest talk, if it sound rough, lends an individual- 
ity and knotty picturesqueness to the commonest 
Englishman, and makes him stand out from the 
rest of mankind like a gnarled oak. 

It is beautiful to see the pleasant relationship 
existing between father and son in England. It is 
free and unrestrained like that of brothers. The 
father yields up his stiff authority and paternally 
critical tone, and descends to meet the son almost 
on a level ; and the son repays this with unbounded 
affection and confidence. The conversation be- 
tween them sounds almost like that between young 
men ; they laugh and jest, and yet the fine sense 
of the true relationship is never lost. I noticed 
this particularly in the case of a young officer and 
his father whom I met at Salisbury. They came 
into the hotel from a walk of sixteen miles in a 
heavy rain, to and from Stonehenge. The father, 
if any thing, was the more brisk of the two. The 
son was an elegant fellow who could quote " Juve- 
nal" about his fish, and who had seen hard service 
in India. He told his soldier stories and advent- 
ures in a genial way, that American sons would not 
do before their father. And I confess I liked it, 
for there seemed to be true love between the two, 
without the actual loss of filial respect. 

Salisbury, the principal city of Wilts County, 
eighty-two miles from London, seated amid its 
broad open downs, is the centre of a highly inter- 
esting region for the antiquarian. Salisbury itself 
has some very old houses, many of them having 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 347 

thatched roofs, which, grown undulating and irreg- 
ular by age, look like black elephants' backs ; but 
its chief interest concentrates in its Cathedral. 
The quiet " Close," occupying an area of half a 
square mile, surrounded by its high wall and quaint 
antique gates, its smooth lawn and noble trees, 
comprehends the church, the Bishop's palace, the 
deanery, and many other buildings of old founda- 
tions. These ancient " Closes," more or less de- 
fined, are found in every ecclesiastical town in 
England, and indicate the former magnificence 
of the Church, taking the lion's share of the city, 
and of every thing good and pleasant in it. They 
were in fact the hearts of the old civilization, the 
centres of power, — cities within cities, — and gen- 
erally ruling all outside of them. 

In this green and tranquil yard sheep roam about 
unmolested, and lie close up under the walls of the 
church. Salisbury Cathedral has a noble and open 
site, and can be seen therefore to peculiar advan- 
tage. The buildings of the city have not been 
allowed to encroach upon and crowd it. It is a 
reverend and awe-inspiring structure, with a moss- 
grown, scarred, and broken front, but all its lines 
are elegant and pure. 

The octangular spire is wonderfully beautiful, 
soaring upward slenderly but to an immense height 
from the forest of crocheted turrets upon the tower, 
its shaft intersected at intervals with richly wrought 
bands. Its height to the top of the cross is within 
two inches of four hundred feet. I recall my last 



348 OLD ENGLAND. 

sight of it. It was on the edge of evening, when 
the sailing mists had left it entirely free and clear, 
and the calm golden light of setting day rested 
brightly for a little time upon it, as it pointed to 
heaven and seemed to show the way. 

The decline of the spire from the perpendicular, 
of about twenty-four inches, has caused apprehen- 
sions of its falling ; and it has been bandaged and 
strengthened, for it is boldly poised on four arches 
thrown across the angles of the tower, and clamped 
with iron. The walls of this tower itself are only 
two feet in thickness. Salisbury Cathedral from 
foundation stone to spire-point, is perhaps the most 
perfect specimen that exists of the " Early Eng- 
lish " style. Its first stone was laid in 1220, and 
it was hardly finished in the reign of Edward III., 
somewhere about the middle of the 14th century. 
It is built of Chilmark stone obtained fifteen miles 
from Salisburv, and is in the form of a double cross. 
Its majestic west front is covered with the finest 
tracery work, and has one hundred and twenty- 
three niches for statues, most of them now empty. 
Its interior, compared with Winchester or Ely, is 
severe and bare, but harmonious. It is not an 
astonishing irregular Gothic epic, but a pure Eng- 
lish poem. The columns are clustered and slender; 
the windows are lancet-shaped and the mouldings 
plain. The length is four hundred and forty- nine 
feet ; and stretched along on either side of this 
grandly extended nave lie the effigies of heroes who 
fought in the Holy Land, carved with their legs 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 349 

crossed, and with broad shields on their breasts ; 
and those also who contended in the ancient bloody 
civil wars, their gorgeous blazonry gone, and some 
of the figures headless and handless, but brave still 
in their wide girdles and chain armor. 

The tomb of William Longsword, first Earl of 
Salisbury, son of Henry II. and Fair Rosamond, 
has been especially battered by time. The Count- 
ess of Pembroke, upon whom Ben Jonson wrote 
the epitaph, is buried in the east choir of the Ca- 
thedral. The place is not marked by a monument. 

The Chapter House, in the " Octagonal Pointed 
Style," supported gracefully by one slight spring- 
ing column of Purbeek marble, as if it were a 
slender fount in stone, shines richly with modern 
gilding and colors. It has been carefully restored. 
The architect supposes that he has authority for 
this high coloring and gilding, from having detected 
the traces of ancient colors here and there upon the 
carved work ; but I agree entirely with the remark 
of a friend, who said, " I doubt whether the room 
ever looked half so gorgeous in the olden time as 
now." 

A series of old sculptures in alto-relievo of Bibli- 
cal scenes, runs around the apartment below the 
windows, and is surprisingly ingenious and elabo- 
rate. The same patience and faithfulness are shown 
in them that we see in ancient missals, and often 
the same exquisite purity of expression. Besides 
these, on the face of the archivolt are a number of 
allegorical figures representing the " Virtues " and 



350 OLD ENGLAND. 

" Vices," which for delicacy and power called forth 
the admiration of Flaxman. Despair presses his 
hand on his heart like the condemned spirits in 
Beckford's Hall of Eblis, and Pity throws a cloak 
over one who is slaying her with a sword. 

On the Cathedral door, as may be everywhere 
seen on parish church doors in England, were 
pasted notices in large letters of " Income Tax — 
Land Tax — Assessed Taxes in this liberty." 

Let us take a walk of three miles or so out to 
'* Wilton House," through the Fisherton suburb 
crossing the Avon, and we will stop first at Bemer- 
ton, about two miles from the city. In this obscure 
village George Herbert lived and labored, following 
out his own words, — 

" Be useful where thou livest." 

It was while walking over this very road, Izaak 
Walton relates, that Herbert stopped to aid a coun- 
tryman whose cart had been upset, and for this 
reason arrived late and dirty at a social musical 
meeting of his friends and brother clergymen in 
Salisbury ; upon being rallied for such an unseemly 
operation, he said that, " the thought of what he 
had done would prove music to him at midnight." 

Turning off the main road down a quiet lane, on 
one side of which is a thick wood, is the little church 
of Bemerton, somewhat larger than St. Lawrence 
Church on the Isle of Wight, but they would match 
pretty well for smallness and humility. It has one 
minute window upon a side, four tiny buttresses, a 
red-tiled roof, and a low flat cupola with a vane ; 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 351 

in the interior are seven pews on each side of the 
narrow aisle, and a gallery for the choir. 

Almost within sight of the proud mansion of his 
own illustrious Pembroke family, here the Rector 
of Bermerton, and the glory of Trinity College, 
Cambridge, fed his illiterate flock. And he hes- 
itated long before he assumed even this humble post, 
so that a tailor happening to be at Wilton House, 
so says Izaak Walton, made his canonicals in great 
haste, he putting off his fine silken clothes and his 
sword to assume them. Yellow tottering grave- 
stones stand around this diminutive edifice and 
crowd up under its shadow, and within its lowly 
walls, under the altar-table, Herbert was buried. 
He taught us that a man is made no greater nor 
less by his place. He is what he is in himself. 
Nothing can lower him if his heart be above. 
Does his own poor earthly life lie buried here, — 

" Gone 
Quite underground ; as flowers depart 
To see their mother-root when they have blown ? " 

Yet that sweet, Christ-like soul, now " past chang- 
ing," sings : — 

" I bud again." 

The parsonage where Herbert lived stands just 
across the little lane that runs by the side of the 
church. His own study is shown. I noticed no 
other houses immediately around. A larger church 
is to be erected near by, by the Herbert family, to 
bear the name of the poet. Sweeter than ever 
to me since this visit to Bemerton have George 



352 OLD ENGLAND. 

Herbert's poems with all their odd conceits grown, 
and, above all, that gem : — 

" Teach me, my Lord and King, 
In all things Thee to see ; 
And what I do in any thing 
To do it as for Thee. 

All may of Thee partake ; 

Nothing can be so mean, 
But for this tincture (for thy sake) 

"Will not grow bright and clean. 

This is the famous stone 

That turneth all to gold : 
For that which God doth touch and own 

Cannot for lesse be told ! " 

Somewhat further to the west, at the entrance of 
Wilton town, in the bosom of a magnificent park, 
stands Wilton House. It was built from designs of 
Holbein and Inigo Jones, upon the site of a Bene- 
dictine Abbey, granted by Henry VIII. to Sir Wil- 
liam Herbert. It is indeed a palace, but has some- 
thing grave and sober about it. Its fair stateliness 
could not be more precisely described than in the 
lines of Wordsworth : — 

" Like image of solemnity conjoined 
With feminine allurement soft and fair 
The mansion's self displayed : a reverend pile 
"With bold projections and recesses deep; 
Shadowy yet gay and lightsome as it stood 
Fronting the noon-tide sun. We paused to admire 
The pillared porch, elaborately embossed : 
The low wide Avindows with their mullions old; 
The cornice richly fretted of gray stone ; 
And that smooth slope from which the dwelling rose, 
By beds and banks Arcadian of gay flowers 
And flowering shrubs, protected and adorned. 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 353 

Profusion bright ! and every flower assuming 
A more than natural vividness of hue, 
From unaffected contrast with the gloom 
Of sober cypress, and the darker foil 
Of yew, in which survived some traces, here 
Not unbecoming, of grotesque device 
And uncouth fancy. From behind the roof 
Rose the slim ash and massy sycamore, 
Blending their diverse foliage with the green 
Of ivy, flourishing and thick, that clasped 
The huge round chimneys, harbors of delight 
For wren and redbreast, where they sit and sing 
Their slender ditties when the trees are bare." 

The trees are of great variety and noble growth. 
One sweeping ilex has its branches supported by 
chains. A group of cedars of Lebanon, towering 
in massy chambers of foliage, gives an almost Ital- 
ian, or Oriental, shading to the picture. The river 
Nadder, which flows through the park, is crossed 
by a bridge in the grounds. In these quiet shades 
Sir Philip Sydney wrote his "Arcadia," — it is 
said, for his sister's pleasure and amusement. 

The suite of state apartments, though superb, 
looked comfortable and as if they were lived in. 
It was not a show-palace. In the " double cube 
room," is the noted collection of Vandykes, most 
of them portraits of the Pembroke family. There 
was one striking picture of Prince Rupert, as a 
youth, calm and beautiful, with none of the dash- 
ing cavalier about it, but a determined look in the 
large brown eyes. I did not notice any portrait of 
Sir Philip Sydney, or of George Herbert. They 
must, however, have been there. A small likeness 
of Florence Nightingale, of whom Lady Herbert 

23 



354 OLD ENGLAND. 

is said to be a particular friend and co-laborer, 
stood upon a side-table. 

It was a luxurious apartment as far as the opu- 
lence of the furniture was concerned, but that was 
not the real feature of the room. I do not dwell upon 
the age-darkened and highly carved furniture, the 
splendid mirrors, the antique marbles, the princely 
books, the pictures, and the hundred objects of or- 
nament and taste about the room, for every thing 
was so harmoniously placed that nothing arrested 
attention ; but there was an aesthetic charm in the 
apartment, which did not allow one to think of 
material magnificence. It was a room worthy of a 
noble mind to take its ease in, to make itself at 
home in. There was no cold splendor to be warmed 
up twice a year on the eve of a great ball, but a 
sense of perpetual ease and enjoyment, a spot 
lighted with tokens of affection and friendship, and 
with all that is soothing and ennobling. 

From the grounds in front of the house, the glo- 
rious spire of Salisbury Cathedral is seen through a 
skillfully made opening in the thick screen of trees. 

The Lombard Gothic church erected by Sir Syd- 
ney Herbert in Wilton, with its square bell-tower, 
as a family memorial church, is one of the most 
gorgeous modern structures in England. It seems 
as if Italy and the Continent had been rifled of 
architectural jewels to enrich it. Its brilliant mo- 
saic pulpit of Caen stone, its white vine-wreathed 
columns, its gleaming brasses, its blue and gold 
frescos, its great sparkling rosette windows, and its 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 355 

antique fonts, transport one from the little English 
carpet manufacturing town, to Siena or Rome. 
Along the top of the screen are carved the words, 
" All things come of Thee, and of Thine own we 
have given Thee." It seemed, however, too rich 
for the place, and had to me a foreign and un- 
English look. 

Wilton itself is a very ancient town, once the 
capital of the West Saxon kingdom ; but it was 
overshadowed by the growth of Salisbury. It was 
a favorite town of Charles I. The first carpet ever 
made in England was here manufactured. Massin- 
ger is said to have been born at Wilton. 

Twelve miles from Wilton, near Hindon, is 
" Fonthill Abbey," now owned by the Marquis of 
Westminster, where Beckford spent twenty years 
and regal revenues in building his jealously in- 
walled Kubla-Khan palace, employing a little army 
of workmen night and day. The gigantic tower 
of his selfish pleasure and pride crumbled, like the 
tower of Babel, as if it had been smitten by an in- 
visible hand. I ascended another Saracenic tower 
erected by him at Bath, from which one could 
almost have seen among the green Wiltshire hills, 
this more Titanic monument of a depraved egotism 
and prostituted genius. 

I have left little room for the two most inter- 
esting places, to an antiquarian, in the whole Salis- 
bury circle, old Sarum and Stonehenge. 

Fortified with a breakfast of hot coffee and muf- 
fins, for this is wild weather, we will tramp off to 



356 OLD ENGLAND. 

scramble over the site of that ancient Saxon city, 
" Old Sarum," the germ of " New Sarum," or 
Salisbury. 

It lies within sight of Salisbury, about two miles 
distant, and is simply a hill cut into great steps or 
terraces, looking like a modern sand-fort, or a huge 
mound which suggests more than it reveals. Back 
to the time of the early Britons this hill w r as a for- 
tified spot ; the Romans made it a great military 
centre, and six roads radiated from it ; in the time 
of Alfred it was a strong city ; under the Norman 
kings it attained great ecclesiastical splendor and im- 
portance, two bishoprics being blended here in one ; 
but in the reign of King John, its bishop, Herbert 
Poore, determined to come down into the plain and 
establish his ecclesiastical seat there. This was the 
death-blow to Old Sarum. Gradually all the in- 
habitants followed him and gathered around the 
rising walls of the new " House of God " in the 
plain below. This new house was itself built of 
the stones of the old cathedal. The circular for- 
tress which once crowned the hill, whose walls 
comprised a space of fifteen hundred feet in circum- 
ference, is now reduced to a ragged mass of flint 
and rubble, which hangs tottering upon the edge 
of the height. This broken fragment is all that 
really remains of this once powerful city of Celt, 
Roman, and Saxon. The hollow of an ancient 
ditch runs around what was the line of the cita- 
del walls. I startled numerous rabbits in running 
around the hill, and from a gloomy tangle of foliage 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 357 

that filled one part of the ditch, an owl whirred 
away ; it is a desolate spot, although a little cul- 
tivation smooths one side of the first terrace. 
Until the passage of the Reform Bill, the election 
of the members from Old Sarum — which Wil- 
liam Pitt so long represented — took place under 
a " witch-elm " that marked the site of the an- 
cient Town House. There is a wide view from the 
top of this discrowned hill, in which Salisbury Ca- 
thedral spire forms the marked feature. 

Stonehenge ! I am not going to add another to 
the many learned theories which lie strewed at its 
base, like rusty tools broken against its granite 
walls ; for when we know who built " Tadmor in 
the wilderness," we may know who heaved up this 
rude circle on Salisbury Plain. 

This mysterious monument lies eight and a half 
miles to the northwest of Salisbury. In coming 
to it one passes over a wide, slightly undulating, 
and thinly grassed chalk marl-down, where now 
and then a weather-beaten " Shepherd of Salis- 
bury Plain " may be seen sitting with his dog and 
staff, and his flock feeding near him. In some 
directions one may ride twenty miles on the plain 
without seeing a house or human being. It is not 
until one strikes into the clearly defined ancient 
avenue that leads up to Stonehenge, and gets 
pretty near the monument itself, that its vast skele- 
ton form can be seen looming over the hillocks. 
There is said to be a gradual ascent to it from every 
direction. As one approaches the temple, the plain 



358 OLD ENGLAND. 

is filled with green circles and round barrows, as 
if it were the burial-place of a numerous nation. 
Some of these mounds have been opened, and con- 
tain the evidences of primitive sepulture. The 
Celtic " cyrch," or cirque, or circle, the national 
sacred place of burial, is said to have been the ori- 
gin of the word " kirk." 

The sky had a threatening look, the heavy clouds 
drooped low, and the gusty autumn wind swept in 
melancholy cadences over the plain, as I saw before 
me this oldest structure now standing in England, 
— this solemn circle of un wrought stones, out of 
whose rocky loins have come forth her life, art, and 
history. 

" Stonehenge " is a Saxon name, meaning " hang- 
ing stone," descriptive of the blocks of stone im- 
posed transversely upon perpendicular masses. 
The Britons and Druids had another name for it. 
It was probably, like the great temple at Avebury, 
in Wiltshire, a hypethral temple, even to the inner 
circle or adytum, where is the sacrificial altar- 
stone. 

It is a circle within a circle. First comes an 
outer trench three hundred and sixty-nine yards in 
circumference. Then a circle of sixty stones, com- 
posed of thirty perpendiculars and thirty imposts, 
fastened by rude mortice and tenon, and forming a 
continuous architrave, the uprights being twenty 
feet high and four feet apart. Then a second con- 
centric circle of thirty smaller stones without im- 
posts ; and then two ovals of huge uprights with 



SOUTHAMPTON TO SALISBURY. 359 

imposts, forming perhaps the real body of the tem- 
ple. In the inner oval is the altar-stone, a block 
of hard gray Derbyshire marble. The other rock 
masses are of crumbling siliceous grit. The entire 
number of stones was originally one hundred and 
forty. Of course many of these have disappeared, 
and many have fallen. A gigantic trilithon recently 
fell with a force that shook the plain. 

The stones taper somewhat to the top, and bear 
but rude marks of the chisel and hammer. Yet there 
is a mathematical unity of plan in the structure. 
It is the thoughtful work of a rough strong people. 
But where did these great masses come from on that 
stoneless plain? And how were they transported 
thither? The character of some of them differs 
entirely from the rocks of the region. 

I feel much inclined to adopt a theory lately put 
forth concerning the origin of Stonehenge ; that it 
was built by the Celts, or native Britons, in the 
Arthurian period, or the fifth century a. d., as a 
sepulchral temple, to commemorate the treacherous 
slaughter of the Celts by Henghist in 461 ; that it 
means " Stone of Henghist." 

In all ancient nations of Celtic origin on the 
Continent, and even to the centre of Asia, circles 
inclose sacred spots. The form of the Buddhist 
temple is always circular. 

Stonehenge could hardly have been a Druidic 
temple, because here is, and has been, no grove in 
which to perform the secret Druidic rites, or to cut 
the mistletoe with the golden knife. 



360 OLD ENGLAND. 

And this locality was evidently the ancient national 
British burial-place, although no signs of sepulture 
are discovered immediately in or under the temple ; 
yet an immense number of " barrows " or sepul- 
chral mounds are found not far from it, and indeed 
everywhere upon the plain. 

Merlin himself might have built it, for he was 
evidently^ the poet, artist, and philosopher of that 
period. 

Harmless sheep feed quietly under this mighty 
solitary form of barbarian power. A rough shep- 
herd clad in skins, with hay leggins and a long 
staff, standing in the shadow of one of the colossal 
pillars, told me the story of the place as it was told 

to him bv his fathers, and will doubtless be told to 

«/ 

others by his shepherd sons. 



CHAPTER XX. 

SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 

By one route from Southampton to Exeter, 
which I had previously taken, I passed through a 
portion of the " New Forest," looking like unset- 
tled land in America, and stopped a night at the 
dull old town of Dorchester, in Devonshire. The 
new line of railway from Dorchester passes through 
the beautiful Axminster and Honiton Valley, near 
Ottery St. Mary, where Coleridge was born. /His 
father was vicar of the Collegiate Church there. 
From this town of Dorchester the " Dorchester 
Adventurers Company " was formed, that settled 
Gloucester, Salem, Charlestown, Dorchester, and 
other towns in Massachusetts. Dorsetshire, and 
Devonshire, and all Southern England, in those 
days, contained a strong element of Puritanism, and 
formed perhaps the chief source of supply to the 
Massachusetts colonies, after the settlement of New 
Plymouth. 

In going to Exeter by the other route, I was 
obliged to wait an hour or two in the little agricul- 
tural town of Yeovil. It was a rainy cold day, and 
in the bit of the tap-room where I dried my wet- 
clothes, the burly farmers and drovers came in to 



362 OLD ENGLAND. 

drink their hot mulled wine, and talk over the 
storm and cattle market, while paddling armies of 
sheep and frightened cows, and now and then an 
ugly red-eyed bull, went by the windows. It was 
" Fair Day." I walked through the cattle-stalls. 
and saw some noble Devonshire oxen and cows. 
The beef, with such layers and collops of yellow 
fat, that one sees hanging up in English butchers' 
stalls, I saw here in its sleek amiable living state. 
Devonshire cattle rather take the lead of tine cattle 
in England. Perhaps the finest specimens of them 
are found in North Devon on the Bristol side. 
They are thus described, and the very particularity 
of the description will show how much is thought 
of such points : " The Devonshire bull has the 
head small ; the muzzle fine ; the nostrils ample ; 
the horns tapering, and of a waxy yellow; the eyes 
large and clear : the neck thick and arched above 
with little dewlap ; the chest is broad and deep ; 
the breast prominent ; the limbs fine boned ; the 
fore-arm muscular ; the hips are high, and the 
hind-quarters well filled up ; the thighs are volumi- 
nous ; the tail long, slender, set on high, and tufted 
at the extremity. The ox is taller and more light- 
ly made, with fine withers and a slanting shoulder ; 
the breast is prominent ; the limbs are fine-boned, 
muscular, and straight, but rather long ; the neck, 
too, is thin and rather long, the head small, the 
muzzle fine ; the horns longer than in the bull, 
slender and tapering. The whole form indeed in- 
dicates activity and freedom of action. The skin 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 363 

is moderate and covered with mossy or curling 
hair ; but occasionally it is smooth and glossy. 
The color is universally red, chestnut, or bay, 
seldom varied with white ; a paler space surrounds 
the eye, and the muzzle of yellow." The cow is 
lighter and full of action and life. Though they 
do not attain to the elephantine size of some of the 
larger breeds, they lay on flesh rapidly, and of the 
finest grain. The cows, grass-fed, weigh from' 
thirty stone to forty stone. The oxen weigh from 
fifty stone to upwards of sixty stone. Hundreds 
of these fine red fellows may be seen along the 
railroad track, cropping the green meadows, or 
lying under the broad -armed trees. England is 
green all the year round ; and no country in the 
world has such grass-feed as this mistv island has. 
And in no other land have there been such persist- 
ent and scientific efforts for the perfection of do- 
mestic cattle. Breeds have been made over and 
over till they are as perfect for this or that quality 
as Nature seems willing to make them. A York- 
shire cow is as different from a Devonshire cow as 
are the dialects of the two counties, and a little 
Kerry ox by the side of a big, coarse Herefordshire 
ox, is a small rattling Pat, compared with a huge, 
slow-revolving, slow-motioned Englishman. 

In the ride from Durston, through Wellington, 
Tiverton and Hele, on the Bristol and Exeter Rail- 
road, true Devonshire scenery began to make its 
appearance, and the rich green hill-slopes, narrow 
valleys, and the red clay, showed that we were in 
" Dark Devon." 



364 OLD ENGLAND. 

The long red cliffs rising from the Exe River, on 
which fair Exeter stands, gave a warm tint to the 
beautiful scenery around that old ecclesiastical city ; 
and already the cold raw air and driving rain of 
the north began to be subdued into a moist drizzlv 
mildness, as if one had come suddenly into a new 
zone. 

At the snug old-fashioned " Clarence Hotel," 
near the cathedral yard, I passed several days. It 
was now the beginning of the fox-hunting season, 
and the " Clarence " was the headquarters of a 
jovial young nobleman with his friends and retain- 
ers, who sallied forth to the " Grand Meet " in the 
morning, in great pomp of scarlet coats, white- 
topped boots, velvet jockey-caps, yellow breeches, 
and heavy whips, to return well bespattered and 
hungry for a feasting, roaring night. All England 
is on horseback at this season. Every one is mad to 
break his neck, or at least his collar-bone. There 
seems to be no affectation in this love of hunting. 
A free-spoken Englishman told me that he had 
been to California and Australia, had traveled all 
over the world, had seen all kinds of life, had 
gambled and fought, and there was but just one 
thing left now that roused him, and that was fox- 
hunting ! 

The days of " fox-hunting parsons " have not 
altogether gone by. I cut out a piece from an 
English newspaper about this time, describing the 
presentation of a testimonial to a clergyman in 
Devonshire, who, for many years, had discharged 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 365 

the duties of a master of hounds in his district. 
In every English town at this season large red 
hunting horses, with their sides literally flashing 
from high grooming, with quick-moving ears and 
springy step, may be seen ridden slowly through 
the streets by their diminutive grooms. Such 
gaunt greyhounds of horses, with pinched bellies 
and straight rail-necks, may have reached the 
maximum of speed, but they have also attained the 
minimum of beauty. How different the Arab's 
estimate of beauty and excellence in a horse, ac- 
cording to Dr. Barth, in the Oriental description 
which he translates of the steeds of heaven : — 
" Sleek swift horses, coursers trained to run, tall 
piebalds, five-year olds, fleet, wide-stepping, apple- 
rumped, plump, long-boned, strong in back and 
neck, Arabian blood horses of El Hodh, that are 
fed upon cooling milk." 

Exeter is a large and stately city. Devonshire 
and Cornwall form one Episcopal See, whose seat 
is at Exeter, and ecclesiastically, socially, and com- 
mercially, it is the principal city of these two coun- 
ties, and of Southern England. It has been some- 
what impoverished by railway speculation, as the 
road to Plymouth was enormously expensive. By 
means of " locks," small vessels can come up to 
Exeter, whose real port is Exmouth, three miles 
below. High Street, which runs under different 
names through the whole length of the city, is a 
broad and in some parts elegant street, containing 
the most attractive art-shops, and book-shops, and 



366 OLD ENGLAND. 

hunting-shops, of any street of a smaller sized city 
in England; it crosses the river Exe by a hand- 
some stone bridge ; the old " Guildhall," which 
stands midway upon it, looks like a bit of quaint 
Flemish architecture, or like an ancient, black, 
elaborately carved sideboard. 

Exeter is the city of churches. The Cathedral, 
as usual, crowns all, and presents a noble appear- 
ance when seen from the other side of the river, 
standing loftily upon its hill-bank, with its two 
massive Norman towers. It does not belong to 
the first class of English cathedrals in point of 
size, but it has some peculiarly rich features, of 
which the singular fleur-de-lys ornament of the 
roof is an instance. Its two Norman towers of 
which I have spoken were built in the twelfth cen- 
tury, and the rest of the edifice belongs to a date 
considerably later than that. The superb stone 
vaulting of the nave is of the deepest and most 
harmonious fan-tracery style, branching as if with 
living stems from lightly clustered columns and 
drooping in heavy corbels and bosses like verita- 
ble bunches of fruit. It is like standing under a 
young grove of low raying palms, compared with 
whose gorgeous tropical luxuriance, the nave of 
Salisbury Cathedral in its pure simplicity is quite 
frozen and arctic. And other parts of the Cathe- 
dral have the same richness of detail ; the windows 
especially, of an elaborately geometrical character, 
are wonderful for the variety of their tracery work, 
never repeating the same designs. The front is 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 367 

renowned for its magnificent stone screen of the 
finest work, called " The Grandisson screen," which 
is thrown like a lace veil suspended over the actual 
dead wall of the edifice ; and this is wrought into 
columns, porches, niches, and statues of martyrs, 
saints, and kings ; while above is the great west 
window, and above that a gigantic statue of St. 
Peter, from whom the church is named. These 
statues, though sadly mutilated, are by no means 
badly carved, and may some of them have been 
portraits ; one old Wessex king, I remember, had 
a nose as decisive of fate as the Duke of Welling- 
ton's. 

There is a boldly carved " Minstrel's Gallery " 
on the left side of the nave, representing twelve 
angels, each playing upon a different instrument, 
and when the music of the organ and the chanting 
rolls through the vaults of the church, it is not 
difficult to imagine that it proceeds from this an- 
gelic minstrelsy. 

In the choir, separated from the nave by a light 
and elegant organ-screen, is the bishop's huge 
throne of carved black oak, towering pyramidi- 
cally nearly to the roof; one could not help think- 
ing if the Apostle Peter had walked into the 
church, would he have seated himself in it, or 
would he have taken the lowest seat in the syna- 
gogue ? The ancient monkish " miserere seats " 
around the choir are fanciful and grotesque ; they 
fold back and show underneath them most extra- 
ordinary carvings — lions' heads, birds, eh phants ; 



368 OLD ENGLAND. 

a boat, with an armed knight in it, towed by a 
swan ; a knight attacking a leopard ; a man stab- 
bing a bird ; a man with pipe and tabor ; a mer- 
maid holding a dish ; — and many other designs. 
What was the idea, I am always asking myself, of 
introducing these odd shapes and thoughts into 
what was considered the most sacred part of the 
edifice ? 

The east window, with some very beautiful frag- 
ments of ancient painted glass in it, is of later 
Perpendicular architecture ; the triplicity seen in 
the arrangement of all its parts, is supposed to be 
symbolical of the doctrine of the Trinity. 

A curious old astronomical clock in the north 
transept is inscribed with the solemn words, — 
u Pereunt et imputantur." 

The Services of Exeter Cathedral, and its whole 
ecclesiastical furnishing, order, and economy, are 
perhaps the most full and gorgeous, carrying out 
the most perfectly and persistently the High 
Church idea of worship, that are to be found in 
any Cathedral in England ; and indeed the tone of 
the city is thoroughly ecclesiastical, or pervaded 
with the sense of the presiding idea of the Church 
hierarchy. The curfew-bell tolls from the old 
towers. The Cathedral Services are as follows : 

" I. Early Morning, Daily. 

"In the Lady Chapel, at 7 a. m. Morning 
Prayers ; and the Litany on Sundays, Wednesdays, 
and Fridays. 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 369 

"II. Morning, Daily. 

"In the Choir, at 10.30 a. m. Full Services 
of the day. The Holy Communion celebrated 
every Sunday and on Christmas day. 

" On the Wednesdays and Fridays in Ember- 
weeks, a Lecture from the Chancellor of the 
Cathedral. 

" The Lord Bishop holds his Ordination on the 
Sundays after the Whitsun and September Ember- 
weeks. 

" III. Evening, Daily. 

"In the Choir at 3 p. m., except on the Sun- 
days from Nov. 1st to Feb. 2d, when it is at 2.30 
p. m. On Sundays the Service is followed by a 
Lecture." 

The present Cathedral Establishment consists of 
the Lord Bishop ; the Dean ; the seven Canons ; 
the twenty-four Prebendaries ; the four Priest 
Vicars ; the eight Choir-men, who are Lay Vicars ; 
the six Secondaries ; the ten Choir-boys ; the two 
Vergers ; and the one Dog-whipper ! 

In spite of this large ecclesiastical force, and the 
great number of other churches, Exeter is said to 
be not at all remarkable for its piety, morality, and 
sober manners. Many of the clergy reside out of 
the city, and are away from it excepting when their 
presence is needed in the public ministrations ; in- 
deed, the missionary idea of active aggressive work 
among the hearts and lives of the people did not 

24 



370 OLD ENGLAND. 

appear so much to prevail, as the more poetic one 
of maintaining a perpetual, dignified, and beautiful 
Church form, before the eyes of the people — but I 
will not criticise where any wish to pray. 

On the Sabbath, the Mayor of the city was 
present at the Cathedral Service in a scarlet dress, 
and the City Recorder in a big wig; and a great 
number of begowned clergy, officials, and boys, 
filled the stalls and a large portion of the choir. 
The Liturgy and Psalms were chanted and in- 
toned ; and when the Commandments were read, 
the reader turned himself toward the east window. 
The preacher, in an otherwise sensible discourse, 
dwelt strongly upon the idea that the real ingraft- 
ing upon Christ was through baptism ; that in this 
way we were made his children and obtained en- 
trance into his spiritual kingdom. No allusion at 
all was made to the terrific storm which had been 
sweeping over England, desolating thousands of 
households, though its blasts hardly yet ceased to 
shake the solid walls of the church — and there 
seemed to be in fact no place in the Service for a 
present and vital emergency. 

Quite near the Cathedral, to the south of the 
choir, is the Episcopal Palace, built of red sand- 
stone, which has a grave and almost gloomy 
look. Its doorway consists of an immense re- 
cessed arch ; the lawn about it is beautifully green 
and shaven, and ornamented with dark laburnums. 
English Bishops have commonly more than one 
paiace — the Bishops of Winchester and London 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 371 

can see the smoke of one of their palaces from 
the top of the other. The Bishop of Exeter has 
£5000 salary, and holds also a rich living as 
Canon of Durham, besides other patronages ; but 
I do not know that he is considered a particu- 
larly wealthy prelate. Indeed, compared with the 
Archbishop of Canterbury who has £15,000, the 
Archbishop of York and the Bishops of London 
and Winchester who have £10,000, his income is 
one of the smallest ; for with the exception of the 
Bishop of Durham who has £8000, and of Ely 
who has £5500, all the other English Bishops 
have £5000 each, or nearly that amount. Yet the 
lowest of these sums sounds very large to Ameri- 
cans, with whom all that is paid for mere dignity 
is considered to be money thrown away. But 
Lord John Russell says that there must be 
" prizes " in the Church. t 

Henry Phillpots, D. D., Bishop of Exeter, whose 
jurisdiction extends over Devonshire and Corn- 
wall, has been a modern St. Bernard, "a dog of the 
Church," an ecclesiastical champion and athlete, 
and in his controversy with Lord Brougham on 
points of English Church History, and in defense 
of Church rights, he showed himself, as far as force 
and skill are concerned, worthy of the palmiest 
days of Catholic Rome. The making of a great 
lawyer was spoiled in him. He is now I believe 
incapacitated by his great age from active duty, 
and is aided by a colleague recently appointed. 

In my frequent walks about Exeter, I fell in 



372 OLD ENGLAND. 

with more than one grave-looking clerical gentle- 
man with black frock-coat cut long, black gloves, 
and black cane, and broad-brimmed hat slightly 
curled up on one side, walking with dignified slow- 
ness, doubtless a reverend canon or prebend ; and 
I must confess, that from some cause or other, 
Exeter gave me now and then a shadowy Roman 
Catholic impression, which the broad honest red 
faces and hearty voices of the common English 
people just as instantly dispelled. 

The walks about Exeter are lovely. One long 
steep hill, leading to what is called " Pennsylva- 
nia or Marypole Head," gives one a charming pano- 
rama. Trudging up this hill, I met an old woman 
holding her hand on her heart ; I asked her if she 
were tired ; " Yes," she said, " very tired ; " this 
is what they called " Break-heart Hill." 

The view from the top of this hill takes in the 
city with its long dark Cathedral pile dominating 
over all ; the vale of the Exe to its mouth, and the 
waters of the British Channel beyond ; and back, 
far in among the swelling hills, the river meander- 
ing past hundreds of peaceful villages and farm- 
houses ; and. to the southwest the dimly-seen blue 
mountain walls of Dartmoor. Descending the hill 
on the other side one gets into the genuine inland 
Devonshire country, a quiet valley lying amid 
green hills cleanly cultivated to the top, with deep- 
sunk, hedged lanes running through it, and a 
noble Elizabethan country-house half way up its 
side, and splendid cattle feeding as if in regular 
military lines on its meadows. 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 373 

This was the season of hedge-pruning; and I 
met men hard at work on the tall luxuriant hedges 
with their broad pruning-bills. 

I had to wait a day or two longer in Exeter on 
account of the road being impassable between Exe- 
ter and Dawlish ; and when I went over it, it was 
amazing to see how the ocean had spurned man's 
strongest work. Brunei was warned not to build 
so near the sea ; and one old man in especial told 
him that the work might last ten or even twenty- 
years, and then there would come a storm which 
would demolish it ; but in the willfulness of his 
genius he despised the warning, saying that " an 
obstinate old man was worse than Parliament." 
Yet he was a great genius ; and this very South 
Devon road, triumphing as it does over all obsta- 
cles, spanning arms of the sea, and striding from 
hill-top to hill-top, is proof of it. 

On the causeway before one gets to Dawlish, 
under the red-clay cliffs just at its side, enormous 
masses of granite had been twisted around and 
tumbled down as if they were cotton-bales ; and 
still the sea was roaring and churning the shells 
and gravel of the long beach in menacing unrest, 
although the sun shone brightly upon the expanse 
of the broad estuary of the Exe River, and upon 
the pretty towns of Topsham and Exmouth on its 
opposite bank. 

Dawlish is a snug little watering-place, cosily 
set in a narrow bay of green hills, with a stream 
running through the centre, and with a splendid 



374 OLD ENGLAND. 

gravelly sea-beach. It was formerly an insignifi- 
cant fishing place, though long ago visited by 
health-seekers ; and the readers of " Mrs. Schim- 
melpenninck's Life " will remember how much she 
speaks of Dawlish. In one place she says : "In 
the beginning of June we left Bath and accompa- 
nied our aunt to Dawlish, where she had just built, 
on a model of her own, a very pretty little villa 
called Seagrove Lodge. We had our abode in a 
small lodging a few hundred yards off. Dawlish 
was not then what it is now. It was no watering- 
place, but a small rural village, pastoral indeed, but 
without pretension either to beauty or picturesque 
effect. It consisted of a straggling line of small 
houses, mostly thatched, and many whitewashed 
cottages, interspersed with little gardens, extending 
irregularly from the sides of a shallow brook, that 
wound through a plashy green full of rushes and the 
yellow-horned poppy, till, crossing through sands, 
it reached the sea. This little stream was crossed 
by a crazy wooden foot-bridge, where the children 
of the village often delighted to angle, while we 
were occupied in the marshy sward beneath in 
gathering the water-cresses growing in the brook 
in great abundance." 

One would hardly recall this " water-color " pict- 
ure in the substantial yellow-stuccoed houses, prim 
green, and noble sea-promenade of the present 
town. 

. The red earth cliffs between Dawlish and Teign- 
mouth are of the most bold and grotesque forms ; 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 375 

• 

they resemble immense Egyptian sculptures in 
their massive character ; for the sea, rude sculptor 
as it is, has hollowed, and carved, and shaped them 
to its own rough fancy. The railway cuts directly 
through some of these great sandstone masses. The 
fragments called the " Parson and Clerk " stand 
out very oddly in the sea, — the red-faced parson 
preaching to the waves, — while another figure, 
below the breakwater when the tide is out, presents 
a still more remarkable appearance, resembling a 
gigantic Capuchin monk, with his ample cape and 
gown wildly Hying in the wind. 

In walking about Devonshire one gets well 
painted with this red clay ; where it has been re- 
cently plowed and the water stands in the furrows, 
it is as bright-colored as red ochre. 

At Teignmouth, a very old town, there is the 
longest bridge in the kingdom ; it has thirty-four 
arches, and is 1671 feet long. This is another 
pleasant health-resort. " The average tempera- 
ture is almost six degrees higher than that of Lon- 
don from October to May, and five lower from 
June to September." 

Newton Abbot, where one takes the branch train 
to Torquay, is a finely situated and wooded place. 

When I looked out of the window the next 
morning upon the streets, harbor, and bay of Tor- 
quay, it was truly " a moving sight to behold ; " 
for every thing was in a state of restless agitation ; 
the rain was leaping and spouting, the small craft 
in the inner harbor were rocking and dancing, and 



376 OLD ENGLAND. 

the big waves outside were tossing their white 
crests in tremendous glee — - another of those fierce 
October gales was upon us, though of shorter du- 
ration. Of course it rained more or less violently 
during the three clays I was at Torquay. But it 
is a continual drizzle at all seasons in Devonshire ; 
for the warm wind from the tropics coming over 
the Atlantic, and charged heavily with moisture, 
deposites itself in a thick mist of soft rain on the 
Devonshire coasts and fields ; and it is this that 
lends them such a dark rich green. Yet there is 
more rain at London than at Torquay ! The aver- 
age number of days on which rain falls in the 
course of the year in Torquay is said to be one 
hundred and thirty- two, and at London one hun- 
dred and seventy-eight. Torquay is looked upon 
therefore as a dry place, being situated between 
two rivers and under the Dartmoor highlands, 
which serve to carry. off the moisture. This, with 
its sheltered situation and warm equable climate, 
makes it a rival of Brighton as a health-resort, 
though for another class of invalids. It is indeed 
snugly and charmingly situated in one of those 
deeply indented bays that stud the shores of Dev- 
onshire — a bay within a bay — nestling itself in a 
gorge under the steep piny cliffs of Park Hill, 
Waldon Hill, and the Braddons, themselves cov- 
ered with noble stone villas. It is a famous up- 
and-down place, and by climbing a little one can 
get very soon into a bracing hill atmosphere. Un- 
able to bear the ennui of an in-door hotel day, I 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 377 

walked around the sea-road and the shore of Tor- 
bay for some distance, though it was, from the 
force of the wind, rather wrestling than walking. 
Sometimes I had to run from a cataract of salt 
water. The sea-road under the cliff had suffered 
in the same manner that the Exeter and Teign- 
mouth road had done ; it was torn, and twisted, 
and knocked all to pieces ; its ponderous stone- 
wall was plowed through in places as by an iron 
share ; and the waves had flung themselves over 
into the garden and roared unceremoniously into 
the door of a villa, which was placed too ambi- 
tiously near the borders of their dominion. 

But the splendid semicircle of Torbay, between 
dimly defined Berry Head on the south, and 
Hope's Nose on the north, presented a grand spec- 
tacle under these circumstances — a broad sheet 
of yellow tumbling yeast, fringed by a wall of 
white foam. King William's fleet would have 
stood a poor chance then to have landed its bold 
invaders. God times the moments and the ele- 
ments in these turning points of history ; for so 
thundered the waves on England's cliffs when the 
Spanish Armada was broken to pieces. " Flavit 
ei dissipati sunV 

Before I left Torquay, however, the storm had 
subsided and softened away, leaving a golden hazy 
atmosphere in which the autumnal sun bathed and 
diffused itself, and at moments broke through the 
vapory heavens with all the more brightness. I 
made excursions to Anstey's Cove and Babbicombe 



378 OLD ENGLAND. 

Bay. At the head of the former, which is a 
tangled, ivy-hung, rock-cloven chasm, stands an 
Italian villa of the Bishop of Exeter, called 
" Bishopstowe," having a wild seclusion and a 
noble sea view. Babbicombe Bay has a pretty 
sweep of silvery beach with red-tinted headlands, 
and a terraced slope to the edge of the cliffs. At 
Watcombe Bay the scene was truly Arcadian, 
green landslips under the cliffs and shepherds with 
sheep feeding. 

In returning I noticed an ancient " Lich-house," 
or place for the temporary deposit of the dead, in 
front of a venerable country church ; these are 
rare now in England. 

A more interesting excursion was to the little 
town of Brixham, just at the southern corner of 
Torbay. It is built in a deep basin between the 
hills, and is a good specimen of an old-fashioned 
English fishing town. As it was " dirty weather," 
the old salts in their flapping hats and Mackin- 
toshes were hanging about the stone piers, mending 
their fishing tackle, or tinkering their little crafts. 
The small harbor was crowded with such craft 
driven in by the storm. The smell of burning 
pitch contended with the more ancient " fish-like " 
odor. The fishing is chiefly done by trawling. A 
new trawlincr-o-ear costs some <£80, and it is there- 
fore no light matter to lose it, as is frequently done. 
An old fisherman said to me, that " it was fine 
sport fishing in pleasant weather, but no fine when 
winter came on." Gudewives had baskets of 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 379 

haicks and whitings for sale, although Saturdays 
are the market days. Brixham is also a famous 
place for turbot, soles, mullet, and cod. At the 
end of the pier there is an obelisk of stone, set in 
granite, bearing the following inscription : — 

" On this stone, 

And near this spot, 

WILLIAM, 

Prince of Orange, 

First set foot, 

On his first landing in 

England, 

5th November, 

1688." 

Macaulay, in his " History of England," gives the 
following picture of this event. " A soft breeze 
sprung up from the south, the mist disappeared, the 
sun shone forth, and under the mild lio-ht of an 
autumnal noon the fleet turned back, passed 
around the lofty cape of Berry Head, and rode safe 
into the harbor of Torbay. The disembarkation 
instantly commenced. Sixty boats conveyed the 
troops to the coast. The Prince soon followed. 
He landed where the quay of Brixham now stands ; 
a fragment of the rock on which the deliverer 
stepped from his boat has been carefully preserved, 
and is set up as an object of public veneration in 
the centre of that busy wharf." 

Although the squall was furious, I scrambled 
up to the top of huge Berry Head, beside which 
" Shakspeare's Cliff" dwindles, and had a talk 
with the old coast-guard there, in his whitewashed 



380 OLD ENGLAND. 

stone hut, over a little smoking furze fire. The 
view from the cliff was grand, though the approach 
to the edge of it, from the violence of the gusts, 
required some caution. Over the bold detached 
headland, which forms the northern boundary of 
Torbay, flew plumes of spray, and the green waves 
of the British Channel, as far as the eye could 
reach, were streaked with foam. 

The veteran coast-guard might hang up his bat- 
tered telescope on its rusty nails and smoke his 
pipe in peace. His only duty was to make himself 
comfortable that afternoon. 

In driving back to Torquay we passed the seat 
of a nobleman, with whose family history the coach- 
man seemed minutely acquainted, and he helped to 
while away a rainy ride over a dull bleak region 
by detailing it to me. Among other things, he 
said that the son of this nobleman, who was as 
great a scapegrace, from his account, as the famous 
" Heir of Linne," had lately lost £ 30,000 in racing 
spiders over a hot plate ! This story I give en- 
tirely on the coachman's authority. 

The season had just about commenced at Tor- 
quay, though the severe weather had prevented as 
yet much thronging of visitors. It is an elegant 
and fashionable town, and has some rich modern 
churches, costly residences, and one of the best 
hotels to be found in the kingdom. The Devon- 
shire country people that one sees on the streets 
here, are generally noble specimens of men, with 
blooming red faces, and eyes as black as sloes; 



SOUTH DEVON AND TORQUAY. 381 

and with their velvet jackets, yellow corduroy 
breeches, huge brogans, miniature felt hats stuck 
on one side of the head, and flowers pinned into 
their coat-collars, they are indeed quite present- 
able giants. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 

Striking again upon the South Devon road, I 
went on to Totness. At Totness we crossed the 
beautiful river Dart, navigable ten miles from Dart- 
mouth. One sees here in England the meaning 
of the names Dartmouth, Exmouth, Plymouth, &c, 
which transferred to our American inland, or sim- 
ply shore towns, have lost all their original signifi- 
cance. From Totness to Plymouth the distance is 
twenty-four and a half miles, and the road passes 
through much interesting Devonshire scenery, 
especially about Ivy Bridge, a favorite neighbor- 
hood for artists. The Dartmoor highlands lie 
somewhat to the north, which though not of great 
elevation are exceedingly romantic, forming a wild, 
solitary, and tempestuous region. 

Plymouth, a name dear to the American, has 
great beauties and charms of its own. I can never 
forget the surprise I experienced at the first sight 
of the harbor of Plymouth from the Hoe prom- 
enade ; to say that it is an English Bay of Naples, 
would have little meaning, for there is no resem- 
blance between the two ; but Plymouth Bay is 
certainly the most noble, varied, and beautiful, of 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 383 

all the English harbors, and there are few in the 
world to compare with it. And out of it about this 
time of the year, perhaps upon such a clear, fresh, 
and golden autumn morning, with the trees of 
Edgcumbe Park just turning crimson, and the 
waves in the bay curling merrily to the breeze, 
the little Mayflower put out to sea, bearing another 
England within her I 

New Plymouth, so the tradition is, was named 
from a fancied resemblance to the old Plymouth. 
The resemblance must be very slight. A Pilgrim 
College is now established at or near the traditional 
spot where the embarkation of the Pilgrims for 
America took place. This event is thus related in 
the " Journal of the Pilgrims : " " Wednesday, the 
sixt of September, the Wind comming East North 
East a fine small gale, we loosed from Plimoth, 
hailing beene kindly intertained and curteously 
vsed by diners friends there dweling, and after 
many difficulties in boysterous stormes, at length by 
God's prouidence vpon the ninth of Nouember fol- 
lowing, by breake of the day we espied land." 

And it seems to be England's destiny still to have 
her population flow away ever from her shores to- 
ward America. With all the increasing wealth of 
England, her system- of taxation falling so unequally 
on the lower classes,* and the tendency of her 
legislation to concentrate the landed interests in the 
hands of a few, so that the small landholders are 
every year diminishing in number and in ability to 
* Walker's Science of Wealth, p. 3*0. 



384 OLD ENGLAND. 

support themselves, and with her untold millions of 
hopeless paupers, great numbers must emigrate or 
starve ; so that willingly or unwillingly England 
still continues to nourish America, and America is 
twice-born of the mother-country. 

The Tamar River widens at its mouth and forms 
Plymouth Sound, and the splendid inner basin of 
the Hamoaze, some four miles long, and capable of 
mooring a hundred sail of the line. The estuary 
of the Plym, called the Cat-water, is a still larger 
anchorage for merchant vessels to the east of the 
city. These are both crowded with vast frigates, 
and with smaller shipping, the view up the Hamoaze 
ending with the long and lofty lines of Albert Bridge 
at Saltash. 

The massive citadel of Plymouth, and the pyra- 
midal rock of Drake's Island, strongly fortified, 
give a grave and solid aspect to the scene ; while 
the lovely banks of the Tamar, and the thickly 
wooded promontory of Mount Edgcumbe, take it 
out of the commonplace of harbor views, and lend 
it a strange picturesqueness. 

Mount Edgcumbe, with its feathery slopes and 
bold banks girdled by the deep blue sea, peculiarly 
attracted — so says his biographer — the painter Tur- 
ner : as did also this whole region about Plymouth 
Bay, and the sweet scenery of the Tamar River. 
And indeed there is no one who has so photographed 
by the sun-flash of genius the varied scenery of all 
England, as this eccentric but enthusiastic lover of 
his native land has done. Born in one of the most 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 385 

obscure of the dingy courts of London, the son of 
a barber, and with the prospect of frizzling hair 
himself all his life, his genius was first fairly awaked 
by the daily sight of the river Thames, and by the 
trees and meadows of Twickenham and Bushy 
Park, in the neighborhood of which he was sent to 
school. He afterward saw the ocean at Margate 
in Kent, where he also went to school ; and there 
he fell in love with the sister of a school-mate, 
which led to the great sorrow of his life, but which, 
perhaps, wedded him the more closely to Art. His 
blue eyes, red face, and stout, short, shabbily dressed 
form, might have been seen a quarter of a century 
ago or more in every part of Devonshire, on its 
southern and northern coasts — he used to say he 
was a Devonshire man — also in Cornwall where 
he sketched St. Michael's Mount, in Wiltshire with 
Beckford, in Kent, in Derbyshire, and above all in 
Yorkshire, his favorite county. He was preemi- 
nently an English painter, as Milton was an English 
poet. Ruskin says that he so caught the trick of 
the Yorkshire hills, rounding as they do at the sum- 
mit with a break or precipice at the foot instead of 
one sheer to the top, that he really made the Alps 
themselves bend in the same way to do homage to 
his unconquerable English genius.* Turner, as far 
as I have gained any conception of his character, 
seems to me to be a type of the best and worst, the 
greatest and meanest traits of the English mind, — 
original, incomprehensible, positive, reticent, acqui- 

* Thornbury's Life of Turner, Vol. I., p. 151. 
25 



386 OLD ENGLAND. 

sitive, tender, rough, despising public opinion but 
eager for a solid and lasting fame. He did not see 
why Italy, or an Italian artist, should monopolize all 
God's beauty in Nature, or that dear misty England 
should be without her Claude — and with tenfold 
more of power, as when the storm awakes in its 
might around the coasts of this green and lovely 
isle. But I have gotten far away from Plymouth 
Bay and Mount Edgcumbe. This last striking 
and beautiful spot, was the place that the com- 
mander of the Spanish Armada set his greedy eyes 
upon as the seat of his power and pleasure after his 
speedy conquest of England, and from the harbor 
near by darted out those nimble little English frig- 
ates under Howard, Hawkins, and Drake, to spoil 
his dreams. Drake, it is related, would play out 
and win his game of bowls, before he stirred a 
step to go aboard his ship, though all Spain and 
Philip himself were coming. As to these same little 
English frigates — we are sometimes apt to regard 
England as if she had always been the great naval 
power that she now is ; but before the reign of Eliza- 
beth she had no navy worth speaking of. Froude 
says that at the beginning of that reign " the whole 
naval force in commission amounted to seven coast- 
guard vessels, the largest of which was but one 
hundred and twenty tons ; and eight small mer- 
chant brigs and schooners, altered for fighting." 
The love of gold and the plunder of rich Spanish 
galleons, and the wild hopes which the opening of 
a New World aroused — America, in fact, with her 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 387 

mysterious magnetic power drawing west to new 
fields of wealth and conquest — here was the true 
originating cause of the maritime greatness of Old 
England. 

At the mouth of the broad harbor stretches that 
wonder of patient science, the Plymouth Break- 
water, a mile long, terminated by a light-house. ' It 
receives the full force of the stormy Southern At- 
lantic as it rolls up into the English Channel. And 
beyond all, fourteen miles out to sea, I could discern, 
even with the naked eye, the tall tapering white 
form of " Eddystone Light-house," and with a glass 
could see the spray dashing in graceful jets at its 
base, under the northerly wind. Smeaton, Rennie, 
Brunei, have crowned Plymouth with works of im- 
perishable honor, — works of peace, humanity, and 
enduring utility. 

I stayed two days in Plymouth, boating in the 
harbor, boarding some of the immense men-of-war 
that lie there so silent and immovable, and tramp- 
ing over Edgcumbe Park, from which one has a 
view of Carson Bay, the favorite anchoring ground 
of Nelson and Vincent ; and here too I had an 
opportunity of studying some of the finest trees in 
England, — oaks, laurels, firs, ilexes, and cedars of 
Lebanon. I also made an excursion up the Tamar 
to the Royal Albert Bridge, the only work of Bru- 
nei that combines stupendousness with economy. 
Generally speaking, his designs have been great, 
and greatly ruinous to all concerned in them. 
Here he seems to have studied cheapness as well as 



388 OLD ENGLAND. 

vastness. It is as plain a structure as could well be 
conceived, but its simplicity is impressive and al- 
most sublime. Its span of four hundred and eighty 
feet and its huge unornamented white iron cylin- 
ders make a lofty gradual arch over the abyss, and 
in spite of the immense piers, and other gigantic 
supports, appear to hold the whole structure sus- 
pended entirely from them. So perfect were the 
preparations, that the bridge was raised at last 
without the sound of a hammer. A man-of-war 
may pass under it with full sail set. 

Old Saltash tumbling up the steep bank under 
the colossal shadows of the bridge, with its irregular 
clustering houses, and boats lying about in confu- 
sion on the gravelly beach, is a piquant bit of pict- 
ure in itself. Above Saltash the Tamar assumes 
a strictly rural, quiet, inland beauty. 

The Royal Hotel at Plymouth was intended to 
be a comprehensive institution, or to embrace hotel, 
coffee-house, theatre, and church, all under one roof. 
It is a ramblinp; old house enough. The sombre 
coffee-room and its low ceiling, middle arch, red car- 
pet, oak-pattern paper, game-piece medallions, and 
polished ponderous mahogany furniture, with the re- 
spectable old waiters in white cravats and aprons, and 
naval officers eating coppery oysters, and talking 
thick over their port wine, are fresh in my memory. 
Here I partook, not for the first time, however, of the 
famous Devonshire " clouted cream" — *- a rich and 
palatable dessert, something like improved " bonny- 
clabber." The method of making it is fully de- 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 389 

scribed in a book on " English cattle " which I 
picked up ; but the real Devonshire milk is to be 
first obtained. " The milk is suffered to stand in a 
vessel for twenty-four hours ; it is then placed over 
a stove or slow fire, and very gradually heated to 
an almost simmering state, below the boiling point. 
When this is accomplished, (the first bubble having 
appeared,) the milk is removed from the fire, and 
allowed to stand for twenty-four hours more. And 
at the end of the time the cream will have arisen 
to the surface in a thick or clouted state, and is re- 
moved ; in this state it is eaten as a luxury, but it is 
often converted into butter, which is done by stir- 
ring it briskly by the hand or stick." By this it is 
seen that it is almost as rich as butter. This 
clouted cream is said to have first come from Corn- 
wall, where it is still a common luxury ; and, 
strangely enough it is an Oriental or Syrian dish to 
this day ; so that some, (by rather a broad leap,) 
have argued from this fact the authenticity of i:he 
Phoenician visitation to Cornwall. 

There are no specially handsome streets in Plym- 
outh, though it is much more of a city than Ports- 
mouth, and with Devenport and its immense dock- 
yard of seventy-one acres, its vast military works, 
and its fine houses and churches, it is a stately and 
imposing place. In the public library I saw three 
pictures by Sir Joshua Reynolds, and an ill-spelled 
letter of his, inviting Boswell to dine. 

We have now to make a rapid tour through the 
last county in England, Cornwall. There is truth 



390 OLD ENGLAND. 

in these remarks of an English writer : " Cornwall 
has been, perhaps, less known and visited by 
tourists than any other of our counties ; and I 
might say less than the capitals of the Continent 
of Europe. You will find in any miscellaneous 
company, many more Englishmen who have visited 
Paris than Truro ; many more who have sailed up 
and down the Rhine than up and down the rivers 
Tamar and Fowey ; many more who know the 
outside and inside of St. Peter's at Rome, than the 
outside or inside, especially the latter, of a Cornish 
copper mine." How many Englishmen, in Eng- 
land and on the Continent, have told me that they 
had never been to Cornwall, and, what is more, 
never wished to go. They have lost the sight of a 
wild and singular region, totally unlike the rest of 
England, and of an interesting people. 

Whirling over the " Royal Albert Bridge " to 
Saltash, one is in Cornwall. The scenery con- 
tinues to be beautiful, and like that in Devonshire, 
until the mining region is reached. The railway 
crosses a number of narrow valleys or gorges 
sloping to the sea, and richly wooded and green. 
The vales of Liskeard and Lostwithiel are charm- 
ing, containing a dark ferny luxuriant vegetation, 
with beautiful river scenery, and noble artificial 
works, broad canals, and stupendous railway via- 
ducts spanning from hill to hill ; for Brunei put 
out all his strength on this South Devon and Corn- 
wall road. At Lostwithiel, on the lovely Fowey 
River, one first begins to see mining carriages, and 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 391 

traces of that immense system of underground 
operations, that convert this end of England into a 
solemn, candle-lit, subterranean hive or prison. 
Before coming to Truro, we passed the famous 
Carclaze tin-mine, with its white clay cliffs. It is 
an open excavation of a mile in circuit, and from 
twenty to thirty fathoms deep. It presents the 
unique spectacle of an out-of-door mine. It is 
worked in an earth called " soft growan " (or de- 
composed granite), and the metal is obtained sim- 
ply by washing. The mine has been worked four 
hundred years, and an incredible amount of metal 
has been taken from it. Now begins to appear the 
true Cornwall scenery, — low hills without wood, 
barren moors covered with a short furze, and more 
commonly still, simple mounds of sand and gravel, 
and holes and pits everywhere. Now and then 
there is a small stone hut with a walled-in min- 
iature kitchen-garden. A wooden shed, some 
spindling poles and tottering scaffolding with clus- 
ters of huts and larger piles of sand and detritus^ 
are the unobtrusive and almost unnoticeable evi- 
dences of what is perhaps a large and rich mine. 
Truro, the capital of Cornwall, is finely situated 
on the confluence of two streams, but beauty is 
sacrificed to business, and sand-heaps, mounds 
of " deads," and all the withering concomitants of 
a mining district, make the environs of this ancient 
town any thing but attractive. Redruth, some- 
what further on, is the very centre of the Cornwall 
copper mines, and of savage scenery. The region 



392 OLD ENGLAND. 

is indescribably bleak and barren. The black 
heights of " Carn Brea," strewed with tempest- 
worn blocks or " tors " of granite, frown over the 
scene. All around the landscape is like that of the 
" Cities of the Plain," after the tempest of fire and 
brimstone had rained on them. There is nothing 
but a continued series of poisonous-looking heaps 
of the exuviae of mines, and a dismal and herbless 
expanse for the eye to rest upon. Out of the town 
few people or signs of life are seen. The life is 
under ground. This is the heart of what is called 
" The Gwennap Mining District." It is chiefly 
cupriferous, and is the richest in Cornwall. The 
little that I have room to say about the Cornwall 
mines, might as well be said here. For a fuller 
treatment of this theme I refer the reader to a 
small book called " Cornwall : its Mines and 
Miners." 

Copper is found in granite and clay-slate, or 
more definitely in what is technically called killas, 
or greenish clay-slate, and especially in the line of 
the junction of this with granite. The vein varies 
in size from the thickness of a sheet of paper to 
that of several yards. Sometimes the miner strikes 
upon a rich " bunch " of metal with smaller veins 
or strings hanging to it, like the root of a vegeta- 
ble. This hope of continually coming upon a prize 
fires him in his hard and solitary toil. According 
to the richness of his gains so is his pay. In the 
common method of working mines, the miner re- 
ceives a certain percentage on the actual value of 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 393 

what he digs. It is thus for the interest of the 
workmen, or " tributers," to make as much for 
their employers as possible ; and there are no 
strikes among the Cornish miners. 

The vast expense and skill requisite in mining 
can hardly be estimated by the uninitiated. It 
is said that the annual cost of mining operations 
in Cornwall is about equal to the annual gains, 
though these are immense. Therefore some must 
lose heavily, while a few only make money. Min- 
ing is a gigantic lottery. It takes the place in 
England of our Western land speculations. To 
hold a share in a mine is perilous business, because 
it is a leasehold which may expire any year, and 
because one's liability is unlimited. Yet almost all 
Cornish men and women, who have any property, 
hold shares in mines. A common-looking, chatty 
woman pointed out to me a mine, called, if I re- 
member rightly, " Cook's Kitchen," and said she 
owned a share there. She got off the car, and 
looked about her with the air of a proprietor. 

The extent and elaborateness of some of the 
older Cornwall mines will account for their ex- 
pensiveness. The " Consolidated Mines," which 
are perhaps the largest, are calculated to extend 
5500 fathoms, or sixty-three miles under ground. 
Some twelve miles of perpendicular depth have 
been sunk in shafts. The old " Dalcoath Mine " 
is 1920 feet deep. These vast depths and ramifi- 
cations have to be drained and ventilated. For 
draining, steam-engines of extraordinary power 



894 OLD ENGLAND. 

must be employed. They are of peculiar con- 
struction, economizing power to a wonderful de- 
gree, and are made in Cornwall. One of them at 
" Austen's Fowey Consols Mine " is thus de- 
scribed : " It has an eighty-inch cylinder 10.97 
load per square inch on the piston, and a length 
of stroke in the cylinder of 10.31, and in the 
pump of 9.25, lifting 87,065,000 pounds a foot 
high, by the consumption of only one bushel of 
coals. It consumes eighty-four pounds of coal in 
an hour." It is estimated that at " Huel Abraham 
Mine 43,500 hogsheads of water have been pumped 
up in twenty-four hours from a depth of 1441 
feet." Ventilation is also effected, or at least 
aided, by the employment of steam, discharging 
foul air and creating circulation. The air of some 
mines is oppressively hot. Men have been known 
to l'ose five or six pounds of weight at a single 
spell of labor, from profuse perspiration at the bot- 
tom of a deep mine, where the temperature is often 
nearer 90° than 80°. 

The hardest work of the poor miner is descend- 
ing and ascending such enormous depths by ladders. 
After a wearing, toiling day in dungeon air, then 
to climb up endless ladders, carrying his tools, full 
an hour's journey, " to grass," — or what would 
be like climbing a mountain without having the 
pure mountain air to breathe, — is almost too much 
for human strength. Heart disease and consump- 
tion are the inevitable results of such unnatural 
toil. The " man-machine," now introduced to 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 395 

some extent in the Cornwall mines, has been a 
great blessing to miners. It is a long rod con- 
nected with a working beam, with a stroke of 
twelve feet. Upon this rod are attached shelves, 
each large enough for two men to stand upon. Up 
goes the rod, lifting the men with it. They then 
step from this shelf upon a shelf fixed on the side 
of the shaft. There they wait until the rod again 
ascends, when they step upon its rising shelf and 
are carried up twelve feet. So they gradually 
come " to grass." An American friend, who ex- 
plored several Cornwall mines, told me, that not- 
withstanding the apparent ease of this process, it 
required nevertheless a quick eye and steady 
nerves. His coat-skirt once became entangled 
upon a descending shelf, and had it not been for 
the quickness of his guide he would have gone 
down with it. 

The life of the miner is not to be envied. He 
works in awful silence by dim candle-light at the 
bottom of a well, and often in the foul air of a 
sewer. His life is in continual peril. And when 
he comes to the upper air, it is to expose himself to 
keen blasts that cut through his frame. He rarely 
lasts more than sixty years. Yet the Cornish 
miner is a contented and, generally speaking, re- 
ligious man. The labors of Whitefield and Wes- 
ley sow T ed seeds among the rocks here that still 
bear rich fruit. Near Redruth there is a large 
hollow, or pit, where John Wesley preached to 
vast assemblies of miners : it is now sometimes 



396 OLD ENGLAND. 

used for great religious gatherings and out-door 
preaching. • 

Tin is usually associated in the same localities 
with copper, and is found likewise in the granite 
and metamorphic rock. It is also procured in 
small quantities from alluvial deposites, like gold. 
This " stream-tin " was what the ancient Britons 
of Cornwall probably sold to the Phoenicians, 
though they may have mined to some little extent. 
Since visiting Cornwall, I have thought that the 
parable of the man finding " treasure hid in a 
field," was not that he found money or jewels, but 
a vein of silver or copper, for which he sells all to 
buy ; and to seek truth as hid treasures, was it not, 
in fact, to mine for it with resolution, skill, and 
success ? The 28th chapter of Job, especially the 
3d and 4th verses, literally translated, are a wonder- 
fully correct description of mining operations even 
at this day. This chapter certainly goes to prove 
the exceeding great antiquity of mining. 

Tin is found in other parts of the world, but the 
grand source of tin is Cornwall. Our New Eng- 
land bright tin pans, and flashing Connecticut tin- 
peddler's ware, were all once hundreds of fathoms 
deep and dark under the Cornish hills. Tin in the 
ore is any thing but bright and promising. It has 
to undergo a vast deal of crushing, stamping, roll- 
ing, puddling, dressing, and smelting, before it 
comes out a shining metal. Tin ore must be, by 
law, smelted in Cornwall, where there is no coal. 
The greatest smelting works are in the neighbor- 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 397 

hood of Truro. A beefsteak cooked on a red-hot 
bar of tin, is the common treat of a visitor after 
inspecting a mine. 

The same vessels that bring coal from the North, 
bear back copper to the North. Copper ore is 
smelted mostly out of Cornwall, at Swansea and 
Neath, in South Wales. But I am not writing 
a book on mining, and my reader can find a 
thoroughly scientific treatment of the subject in the 
little volume I have recommended. Few subjects 
are more curiously interesting from the force of 
mind, the will and courage, the ingenuity of inven- 
tion, the singular geologic phenomena, and the fresh 
and novel facts developed by the every- day work- 
ing of the whole stupendous system. 

From Redruth, the railway passes by and over 
a portion of sandy-shored St. Ives' Bay, at Hayle. 
St. Ives is a great point for the " pilchard fishery." 
This fishery is almost altogether confined to the 
shores of Cornwall. Once a year these little fish 
swarm up from the Southern seas to the English 
coasts. When they approach land in vast shoals, 
they are eagerly watched and taken in great seines. 
The net is one hundred and ninety fathoms long, 
and costs some £170. The author of " Cornwall 
Mines and Miners " says that at the town of St. 
Ives, no less than 1000 hogsheads of pilchards were 
once secured in three casts of the seine. And in 
the little town of Trereen, 600 hogsheads were 
taken in a week. As 2400 fish make a hogshead, 
no less than 1,400,000 pilchards were caught. 



398 OLD ENGLAND. 

These are salted and sent to the southern coun- 
tries of Europe, to supply good Catholics with fish 
in their Lenten season ! The pilchard is somewhat 
smaller than a herring, and does not compare with 
it for eating. 

Pilchard fishing is said to be a very picturesque 
and stirring sight, especially if it take place at night 
bv torchlight. The nets then look like masses of 
molten silver. 

St, Ives in Huntingdonshire, and not St. Ives in 
Cornwall, is probably the famous one of the nursery 
rhyme. It is strange to think how slender the neck 
of England is here ; one can almost see across it. 
We are fast coming to the end of all things. 

The people one meets here in the little one-track 
junction railway, are of a very plain, frank, sociable 
cast. London superciliousness and reserve have 
altogether vanished, and you talk freely with your 
neighbor. Everybody is acquainted with every- 
body, and a stranger is looked upon as one to 
whom all are bound to be polite and entertaining. 
I gathered a great number of facts about mining 
and pilchards, which, I am sorry to say, I do not re- 
tain. The general impression 1 received was, that 
the zeal for mining was on the decline ; that it 
was too unhealthy, dangerous, and above all pecu- 
niarily uncertain business. It was heart-breaking in 
its crosses and disappointments. One fact I recall. 
An enterprising " adventurer " — so all are termed 
who speculate in mines — had spent £ 94,000 upon 
a mine and died of disappointment ; while his sue- 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 399 

cessor a few weeks after began to realize — I hold 
to this excellent Americanism — an immense for- 
tune from the same mine. 

A young Episcopal clergyman sat opposite to me, 
with the most approved pre-raphaelite cut to his coat 
and visage, with whom I fell into conversation and 
found him an intelligent and genial man. At 
parting he gave me a line of introduction to his 
father-in-law, a distinguished clergyman living at 
Pendeen, with whom he made me promise that I 
would pass the next Sabbath. 

The first sight of " St. Michael's Mount " gilded 
with the fires of a lurid sunset, and of the foam- 
fringed expanse of " Mount's Bay," had to me a 
touch of the romantic ; for I had ever associated 
the " Mount '•' with a certain dreamy undefined 
antiquity, and with Milton's poetry. 

It was storm and shine during my stay at Pen- 
zance, though the former predominated. There is 
a saying that there is a shower every day in Corn- 
wall, and two on Sunday. But the temperature in 
this autumn season was much milder and softer 
than I had experienced further north. The 
changes are sudden from dark to bright, from rainy 
to clear. This part of England has a Mediterranean 
climate. Around Penzance, on its sloping hill-sides, 
there was a pleasing girdle of green gardens and 
fields, though almost everywhere else sand and 
rock, and a scantling of grass, were the monotonous 
features of the scenery. The myrtle and hy- 
drangea, and other Southern European plants, grow 



400 OLD ENGLAND. 

freely in the open air. The winter temperature of 
Penzance is 42°, while that in the neighborhood of 
London is 35°. The summer is cooler and the 
winter warmer. Penzance is also well protected 
from the tremendous westerly gales which are the 
most severe of any in England; though in the 
spring of the year its easterly exposure makes it 
somewhat uncomfortable. It is becoming quite a 
health-resort. It were worth a visit to make the 
evening promenade along the sounding beach, and 
to see the Atlantic billows roll into " Mount's Bay," 
and the sun sink behind the stern rocks and barren 
hills toward Land's End. 

" Mount's Bay " is a singular example of the 
geologic theory, of the comparatively recent sink- 
ing of the land to form an ocean floor. Evidences 
of the submerged forests frequently make their 
appearance. " St. Michael's Mount " was once, 
by tradition, a rock in the midst of a great internal 
forest. 

One should not forget while in Penzance to 
visit the Serpentine Stone Works. This beautiful 
igneous stone which takes such an exquisite polish, 
is procured mostly from the Lizard near by ; it has 
for its basis the silicate of magnesia, with oxide j 
of iron, chromium, and manganese. The silicate 
of aluminum gives it a golden gleam. Few an- 
tique marbles, such as one picks up amid the ruins 
of Rome or Baias, may compare with the richness 
of this dark red and green variegated stone, as if it 
still held the fires that hardened it. The end of 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 401 

England is ever-yiointed. The ocean vainly washes 
its everlasting hills. 

In the summer time the contrasts of these richly 
colored rocks of the Lizard, with the pearly white 
sands of the little coves and bays, and the blue 
waters of ocean, are said to be exquisitely beautiful 
and fairy-like. 

There is a good geological museum at Penzance. 
The town, of about seven thousand inhabitants, is 
a primitive place enough. My chamber window 
at the old-fashioned inn looked out on the quiet 
yards, ancient chimney-pots, and lonely blue sea be- 
yond. I ate my solitary meal in dignified silence. 
Walking the streets one feels somewhat like a " pil- 
chard " on shore, or a bird that has wandered from 
its place. Yet every one is polite and good-na- 
tured. Only you are a break, an exception, in the 
well-soldered community. You belong to another 
than the Cornwall world of things. When you 
have seen Penzance and Land's End, go back to 
London, to Paris, to the world. 

At the evening hour some horrid noises and 
yells rang through the sober little Methodist town. 
A squad of beery fishermen, or flush young miners, 
were making a demonstration in their congenial 
darkness, — dangerous business one would think so 
near the jumping-off place. 

I paid a visit to Marazion, or Market Jew, a walk 
of about three miles on the northern shore ; it is an 
ancient town, where tin was worked by the Jews in 
the reign of King John, and even earlier. It is, in 

26 



402 OLD ENGLAND. 

fact, the oldest town in Cornwall. It stands upon a 
hill-side which slopes to the north, and contains 
some very old houses, furnaces, and relics of the prim- 
itive Jewish town. The " Marazion circle " of tin 
mines, some twenty-seven in number, have the rep- 
utation of beino- losing and unfortunate concerns. 

Just opposite Marazion is " St. Michael's Mount." 
It stands either entirely out of the sea as an island, 
or as forming the end of a very doubtful and moist 
peninsula, according to the time of day you visit it. 
That it was the ancient " Ictis," and that the Isle 
of Wight was not, in spite of its Latin name, all at 
least who visit Cornwall are prepared to defend. 
The famous passage from Deodorus, a writer in the 
the time of Augustus Cassar, reads thus : " The in- 
habitants of that extremity of Briton which is called 
Bolerion " (supposed to be Land's End) " both 
excel in hospitality, and also, by reason of their in- 
tercourse with foreign merchants, they are civilized 
in their mode of life. These prepare the tin, work- 
ing very skillfully the earth which produces it. 
The ground is rocky but it has in it earthy veins, 
the produce of which is brought down and melted 
and purified. Then, when they have cast it into 
the form of cubes, they carry it to a certain island 
adjoining to Britain and called Iktis. During the 
recess of the tide the intervening space is left dry, 
and they carry over abundance of tin to this place 
in their carts ; and it is something peculiar that 
happens to these islands in those parts lying be- 
tween Europe and Britain ; for at full tide, the in- 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 403 

tervening passages being overflowed, they appear 
like islands ; but when the sea returns a large space 
is left dry, and they are seen as peninsulas. From 
hence, then, the traders purchase the tin of the na- 
tives, and transport it into Gaul, and finally, travel- 
ling through Gaul on foot in about thirty days, they 
bring their burdens on horseback to the mouth of 
the Rhone." 

Thus the " Mount " is probably the earliest his- 
toric point in England. It is the link that con- 
nected Britain with the civilization of Rome and 
the East. It afterward assumed an ecclesiastical 
character, and was the place of pilgrimages to the 
shrine of the angel " Michael," who alighted on 
the rock in his flight from heaven. Lady Catherine 
Gordon, ("Rose of Scotland,") wife of Perkin 
Warbeck, took refuge here. Charles I. visited it 
during the wars with the Parliament. The Corn- 
ish men were strong royalists. 

When I saw the " Mount," it rose majestically 
from the bosom of the sea, and the waves dashed 
around its base. One could hardly believe that it 
was not always an island, for it is some distance 
from the shore. Two strong fellows pulled me out 
to it, and seemed quite anxious that my visit should 
be a short one, for the storm was brewing fast. 
Landing on the old slimy stone pier, I found quite 
a marine colony there. Fishermen hung about on 
the sea-wall, smoking their pipes, and watching the 
veering and menacing clouds. I ran up the broken 
grassy steep at the foot of the castle, and to my 



404 OLD ENGLAND. 

surprise was admitted to a beautiful castellated 
residence, the property of the St. Aubyn family. 
The room called " Chevy-Chace Hall," and the 
other apartments, though small, are handsomely 
furnished, and are lived in during some months of 
the year. The chapel is the chapel of the old 
Benedictine Monastery. I went up on the battle- 
ments, and had a noble view of the whole extent 
of " Mount's Bay " to the Lizard on the north, and 
Penzance with its background of green hills and 
villas, and the bold black headlands toward Land's 
End on the south. The last storm had shaken the 
castle to its foundations, and even now the wind 
was so strong that it was difficult standing. Here 
is the famous stone chair jutting out from the top- 
most battlement over the abyss, which secures to 
one who first sits in it the authority in the domestic 
circle. 

On our return we did not have quite so success- 
ful a time. The sea had risen considerably, and in 
approaching the shore we made two ineffectual 
attempts to ride in on a big wave, and were well 
drenched ; but by skillful management we at length 
shot in on top of a long roller. 

The " Mount "is an impressive object from the 
shore. It rises pyramidically in bold steps or plat- 
forms, crowned by the compact though irregular 
mass of the castle, which seems to grow out of the 
rock. I tried to discover the " lion " that guards 
the Mount. A rude mass of granite looking south- 
ward, by a lively imagination, might be shaped into 



CORNWALL AND PENZANCE. 405 

a monstrous lion. While we are (in fancy) look- 
ing at the " Mount," lifting itself like a vision of 
majestic power through the scud of the whistling 
storm, let us hear Milton's lines like a strain of 
music above the storm : — 

" Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, 
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine, 
The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet, 
The glowing violet, 

The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears : 
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed, 
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, 
To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies — 
For, so to interpose a little ease, 
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise. 
Aye me ! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas 
Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurled, 
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides, 
Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide, 
Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ; 
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied, 
Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old, 
Where the great vision of the guarded Mount 
Looks toward Namancos and Bayonet's hold ; 
Look homeward, angel, now, and melt with ruth ; 
And ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth. 
Weep no more, woful shepherds, weep no more." 

Since I have quoted so much, I will not omit 
giving also the fine sonnet of Bowles, (the inspirer 
of Coleridge's poetic genius,) upon St. Michael's 
Mount : — 

" Mountain ! no pomp of waving woods hast thou, 
That deck with varied shade thy hoary brow; 
No sunny meadows at thy feet are spread, — 
No streamlets sparkle o'er their pebbly bed; 



406 OLD ENGLAND. 

But thou canst boast thy beauties, — ample views 
That catch the rapt eye of the pausing Muse : 
Headlands around new-lighted ; sails, and seas 
Now glassy smooth, — now wrinkling to the breeze; 
And when the drizzly winter, wrapt in sleet, 
Goes by, and winds and rain thy ramparts beat, — 
Fancy may see thee standing thus aloof, 
And frowning, bleak and bare, and tempest-proof, 
Look, as with awful confidence, and brave 
The howling hurricane ; — the dashing wave ; 
More graceful when the storm's dark vapors frown, 
Than when the summer suns in pomp go down." 



CHAPTER XXII. 
land's end. 

The next morning was a driving storm, but I 
determined to see Land's End that day, and was 
rather glad that I could see it in all its grandeur. 

I started early with a silent but well-mannered 
driver, in an open wagon, and with a powerful fast- 
trotting bay horse. The wind blew too hard for 
an umbrella; so, tucking ourselves in as well as we 
could, we made up our minds for a thorough wet- 
ting;. The drive to Land's End in a direct line is 
about eleven miles, though longer by the course we 
took. We skirted the bay till the road began to 
ascend toward New Lyn, giving us broad views of 
Penzance and the harbor. We came at length 
upon the high table-land, rocky and dismal, with a 
little sprinkling of grass and Cornish fern. 

As if determined to get to mvself all the dis- 
agreeabilities possible that day, I alighted in the 
neighborhood of Lemorna Cove, and ran down to 
see the rock scenery of that rugged bay, intending 
to meet my wagon at another point around some- 
where further on. After a scrambling, lonely walk, 
over stone and bog, I came out, as I supposed, at 
the appointed spot, but no carriage was there. It 



408 OLD ENGLAND. 

was a desolate place and a wild storm. I was puz- 
zled what to do. I thought it best to walk on in 
what I conceived to be the direction of Penzance, 
thinking that I might come upon a house, or meet 
a traveler. After walking some time in this state 
of suspense, to my great satisfaction my lone dog- 
cart hove in sight at a considerable distance off, 
coining in a totally opposite direction from what 
I had anticipated, I will not pretend to go into 
explanations ; but the driver declared that he had 
been faithful to his part of the engagement, had 
been to the appointed place, and not finding me 
there, had come on to seek me. " All 's well that 
ends well," I thought, especially if it lands me at 
Land's End. 

We left St. Buryan to the right, with its lofty 
old church-tower four hundred and sixty-seven feet 
above the sea level, the most conspicuous object on 
the moor, and a beacon to ships far out at sea. I 
stopped to examine the Druidic circle of the 
" Merry Maidens and Piper," consisting of six- 
teen moss grown gray stones ranged in a circular 
form. They were once, it is said, frolicsome Cor- 
nish maidens, petrified for dancing on Sunday. 
But how hard and angular they have grown since 
then ! In the storm-wind that whistled by them 
the ancient piper might be heard to play again, 
but their dancing days are over. This circle be- 
longs doubtless to the same ancient Celtic system 
of burial, or worship, to which Stonehenge be- 
longed. 



LAND'S END. 409 

Cornwall is full of these old circles and crom- 
lechs ; it is the land of pagan legend and mystery. 
It does not look like green, sunny, merry, Christian 
England. It has a wild, broken, granitic scenery. 
Its very names have strange old heathen sounds — 
such as Lemorna, Trengothal, Trereen, Lanyon, 
Penryn, Madon ! 

We stopped for a moment to see an antique 
stone cross, — a cross within a circle. It was a 
remnant of the earliest days of Christianity in 
England. How it did rain and blow when I 
tramped down from the streaming thatched-roofed 
cottages of Trereen, over the rocky meadows to 
the sea-side, to take a look at the " Logan Stone." 
It was any thing but a comfortable feat to climb 
up to it, and still less atop of it, in such a storm. 
But I was fairly in for it. I shall always contend 
that it was just the season, and just the day of all 
days, to see this grand rock-coast scenery. Who 
would go to Italy in mid-winter for Italian scenery ! 
Who would see Land's End in summer sunshine ! 

The " Logan Stone " is a detached mass of rock, 
perched on a lofty promontory jutting out into the 
sea, and is about seventeen feet high, and weighs 
sixty-five tons. My guide laid his broad shoulders 
to it, and made it rock slightly. It was once 
thrown over by the freak of an English midship- 
man, and was reinstated with great difficulty and 
expense. Being originally a cubical mass of 
granite, bv the action of storm and time its base 
had become disintegrated, so that it now rests on a 



410 OLD ENGLAND. 

separate neck or pivot. The perpendicular rocks 
about it, seamed and scarred, with the hollow 
scooped out by rain and storm, called " The Giant's 
Throne," like the chair in which Gothe's ancient 
king sat, when he cast the golden goblet into the 
sea, are fully as interesting in themselves as the 
" Logan Stone/' Treryn Castle, in the days of 
the Britons, is said to have stood here. I am in- 
clined to think, however, that the castellated con- 
formation of the rocks has given rise to this tradi- 
tion. Here also is a fine point of view of the 
stern coast scenery, the rocky headlands and deep 
indented bays, with great caverns dug out by the 
waves, and " swilled by the wild and wasteful 
ocean." 

We went on, turning here and there into cross- 
roads, that would have sorely puzzled a stranger. 
It seemed as if now that point ahead were Land's 
End, and then another point, and then another 
still. The scenery grew more desolate and dismal, 
this effect being undoubtedly heightened by the 
black storm. We passed a cheerless stone house 
facing the ocean, upon one side of which was 
written " The Last Inn in England," and upon the 
other side " The First Inn in England." 

When we actually turned down to go out to the 
promontory termed Land's End, I will not say that 
the wind blew us bodily off the road, if road it 
might be called over the moor ; but it seemed at 
one time doubtful whether we could stem the 
storm, or make any headway at all. The blasts 



LAND'S END. 411 

from the ocean were tremendous. In such a storm 
sweeping around England's coast, Shakspeare must 
have written the words that Macbeth spoke to the 
witches : — 

" Though you untie the winds, and let them fight 
Against the churches; though the yesty waves 
Confound and swallow navigation up; 
Though bladed corn be lodged, and trees blown down; 
Though castles topple, on their warders' heads j 
Though palaces and pyramids do slope 
Their heads to their foundations; though the treasure 
Of Nature's germins tumble all together, 
Even till destruction sicken, answer me 
To what I ask you." 

There is an idea of the all-levelling might of the 
ocean blast, in these lines, that one can better ap- 
preciate who is mad enough to attempt to face it, 
on the barren unprotected slopes that lead out to 
the extreme end, — or one might say, — the prow 
of England, where she plunges into the Atlantic. 

When we came at length to actually the last 
house in England, a lonely low fisherman's hovel, 
standing slightly on one side of the promontory 
termed " Land's End," we had to take advantage 
of a slight lull to run from the shed to the house. 
There was no seeing it at that moment. A man 
could not well go upon the rocks at the height of 
such a tempest. He would have run the risk of 
being blown off like a cotton ball. The sea just 
below us was in a state of furious agitation. Through 
the rain and the flying scud we could just see, with 
a glass, the tall white pillar of " Long Ships Light- 
house," a mile from shore, to the top of which the 



412 OLD ENGLAND. 

foam of the billows flew, though it stands one hun- 
dred and twelve feet above the level of the sea. 

Some coals were smouldering on the rude hearth, 
and the old fisherman who inhabits the house 
roasted a pilchard, and with a cup of tea and hard 
sea-biscuit, we made a famous meal. It was of 
little use to attempt to dry our clothes. 

After waiting an hour or so, there seemed to be 
some abatement of the storm, or there was, at 
least, a perceptible interval between the blasts. In 
one of these comparative lulls, the fisherman said 
we might make a run for it. We had to traverse 
quite a tract or hollow, and then climb over the 
crown of a hill. The fisherman and I started at a 
rapid run. Before we reached the top of the 
promontory, the gust came on again, and I had to 
depend upon my guide's strong arm to stagger 
against the violence of the side-blast, and to get 
over the hill into a more sheltered spot. Great 
flakes of blinding foam flew like a snow-storm over 
and around. When we had struggled over the hill, 
we crept along its side under the lee of some cliffs, 
though the bank of slippery turf slopes off here 
quite abruptly. Proceeding carefully, and clinging 
to the summit of the cliffs, we picked our way 
down, shelf after shelf, worming through and over 

7 * jo o 

the crags, till we came to a jutting mass of rock 
beyond which there was nothing, and holding me 
in his iron grasp, the guide and I stepped upon this 
outstanding rock, and looking over its edge into 

O ' o o 

the foaming abyss below, stood upon " Land's 
End." 



LAND'S END. 413 

I stayed long enough to knock off a bit of 
granite, and then retired a few steps to a more 
sheltered position, where I might take a deliberate 
view of the scene. Just above us were the dark 
and storm-scarred fronts of the granite cliffs, rising 
in some kind of columnar regularity, as if they 
were the gigantic advance-guard of England, sta- 
tioned here to receive the first shock of tempests. 

Off the crest to our left was the long and singu- 
larly shaped rock, called " The Armed Knight ; " 
and a few more black and formidable crags stretched 
from the end of the promontory, though buried at 
moments amid the boiling waves. 

How grand, beyond description, was the sight of 
the roused Atlantic hurling its maddened strength 
upon the rocks, which bore the marks of a thou- 
sand such conflicts, and were there still, firm and 
unshaken, where God had placed them, to guard 
the land ! 

I watched the great billows pouring swiftly in 
upon the land, unconscious that they had come to 
the end of their course, and then suddenly, furi- 
ously, flinging themselves on high, as if in astonish- 
ment at meeting resistance, covering the tallest 
cliffs with their rage and foam. 

In creeping back over the crags, I found we had 
come over a natural arch, which links the ex- 
tremity of the promontory to the main land. By 
stretching one's self upon a ledge, and looking 
around a corner, one sees clean through the vault 
beneath into which the ocean rushes and roars as 
if in play. 



414 OLD ENGLAND. 

We saw a mast with tangled cordage still hang- 
ing to it, rolling and tumbling about in the foam, 
which my guide said must have been a part of a 
very recent wreck. 

Of course I did not see the Scilly Islands in 
such weather. They may be seen, however, if I 
mistake not, in clear weather, from this point. 
The tradition is that they were once connected 
with the main land ; and fable and mystery still 
enwrap them, lying as they do in the very eye of 
the sunset far out on the lonely wastes of the 
ocean. There are to be found in these islands, 
it is said, spots of greenery and beauty that are 
truly delicious. 

Regaining the house, and waiting some time 
longer for the storm to subside a little, we made a 
start for Sennen and the Botallack mines ; and 
amid a driving tempest of rain we went on to the 
north, over a bleak moorland, passing by very few 
villages or signs of habitations, leaving the frown- 
ing headland of Cape Cornwall on our left, and in 
the latter part of the afternoon reached Botallack. 

There are few things in the works of man more 
daring or wonderful than the Botallack mines ; for 
where the veins of copper and tin run off into the 
ocean, there man has stationed himself to inter- 
cept them, and has not only followed them to the 
edge of the land, but has pursued them far under 
the sea. 

Along the face of a lofty precipice which de- 
scends sheer into the ocean, and is exposed to all 



LAND'S END. 415 

the fury of the Atlantic, mining works, tramways, 
and ladders, have been constructed, so that they 
dangle down over the face of the enormous cliff in 
the most extraordinary and appalling way. Half 
down the precipice a steam-engine is stationed, 
which serenely pumps away in spite of wind and 
storm. Far up above it on the edge of the rock 
are other works ; for the ore is carried up the face 
of the cliff to the upper sheds, as if men were lit- 
erally living and working over the steepest side of 
Gibraltar. I went to the mouth of the midway 
shaft with the intention of descending into the 
mine ; but it was Saturday afternoon, paying-time, 
and the mines were not in operation. 

This mine, I have said, runs under the ocean ; 
and it comes up in one place where the miners 
have pursued a vein to within five or six feet of the 
floor of the ocean, so that in a storm, the rolling 
and grinding of the great rocks and pebbles on 
the bed of the ocean overhead may be distinctly 
heard ; and always the solemn thunder of the sea 
is faintly audible. 

The Botallack mines are now chiefly worked 
for copper, although they have yielded in former 
times very richly in tin ; and they are said to have 
afforded a profit at one time of .£300,000. 

On the edge of the evening we reached Pen- 
deen ; and we drove up in the midst of the still 
violent tempest to the door of Rev. Mr. A.'s house, 
the clergyman to whom I had a note of introduc- 
tion. His house was situated in a large yard, with 



416 OLD ENGLAND. 

a high wall around it, containing his church and 
house, — in fact a kind of modern " conventual 
establishment " on a small scale. A large, com- 
manding-looking, elderly gentleman, in a long black 
cassock, or dressing-gown, received me at the door 
with great cordiality ; and soon I was drying my 
dripping clothes, and warming my chilled limbs be- 
fore a glowing grate, in a room which was the 
very picture of ecclesiastical repose and gravity. 

" The vicar was of bulk and thews, 
Six feet he stood within his shoes, 
And every inch of all a man ; 
Ecclesiast on the ancient plan, 
Unforced by any party rule 
His native character to school ; 
In ancient learning not unread, 
But had few doctrines in his head; 
Dissenters truly he abhorred, 
They never had his gracious word. 
He ne'er was bitter or unkind, 
But positively spoke his mind. 
Their piety he could not bear, 
A sneaking, snivelling set they were : 
Their tricks and meanness fired his blood; 
Up for his Church he stoutly stood. 
No worldly aim had he in life 
To set him with himself at strife." 

The description of Arthur Hugh dough's, might 
in essentials apply to the bulky and dignified man 
who had thus received me out of the wild storm 
into his hospitable house. It was indeed a sudden 
transition. The comfortable though austere par- 
lor, in which my entertainer and myself sat during 
the evening, while the tempest raved without, was 
hung with pictures of old Catholic subjects and 



LAND'S END. 417 

saints ; a mediaeval brass-bound coffer stood on the 
centre-table to hold valuable papers ; bits of painted 
glass, and plans for church architecture, were upon 
the mantel-piece and scattered about the room ; 
and a large case of books filled up one end. Most 
of these books were the works of the French Jan- 
senists, and came from the original Port Royal 
library. They were bequeathed to Mr. A., as I 
understood him to say, by Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, 
the biographer of the Port Royalists. Such little 
marks would at once indicate something of the re- 
ligious status and character of my excellent host, 
but they would by no means tell all ; nor do I feel 
myself permitted to tell all ; and yet I do not think 
a man like Mr. A. would be annoyed by the men- 
tion of some of his peculiar ecclesiastical views, 
which are well known, and which illustrate one 
phase of the religious condition of England at the 
present time. 

A man of high culture and powerful mind he had 
aspired to something more than intellectual emi- 
nence. He aimed at a life of exclusive devotion to 
the higher truths of Faith and the Divine life. 
There was a strong infusion of the mystic, and 
even ascetic element, coloring and shading his 
hearty religious sympathies. He believed in widely 
different and progressive spheres of spiritual attain- 
ment ; that all men were not capable of the highest 
spirituality, and that perhaps this distinction would 
forever exist. There were some who were called 
to a life of exclusive consecration to, and of purer 

27 



418 OLD ENGLAND. 

union with the All-Perfect. They were chosen 
spirits, men who, like Paul, despised their material 
nature, denied themselves the delights of taste, 
and whose spirits were continual temples of God ; 
they were the select priests of God ; they were 
the peculiar media of His transmitted Spirit. He 
believed in this true Apostolic succession, ■ and 
was an earnest supporter of the Tractarian view 
of the Church, the order of its ministry, the com- 
prehensiveness of its service, and the vital efficacy 
of its sacraments. He declared decidedly, that the 
only hope of the Church of England, and of Eng- 
land in a religious point of view, lay in the Puseyite 
wing of the Church; not in the unconverted por- 
tion of it, who only formed the skeleton and dry 
bones, but in those whom God's Spirit had renewed. 
They were fitted, he said, by their legal education, 
their lives of self-denial and self-mastery, to en^ 
dure hardness, as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, 
and were like John the Baptist, coming up out 
of the wilderness, to proclaim the advent of the 
true Light. They were men, hardy, single-eyed, 
and able to do men's work And they held the 
only true conception of the Church of God. He 
had learned this truth through much strife and 
affliction. He had once been an evangelist, going 
here and there, preaching as he pleased and 
where he pleased. He had thought that all men 
shared equally God's Spirit. But he had been 
drawn to the truth of the visible unity of the 
Church, — that it must be somewhere. If it were 



LAND'S END. 419 

in Rome, he determined to go there. It was, he 
found by searching and prayer, where one Spirit is 
given in baptism by the hands of one chosen body 
of anointed ministers, forming one visible Church of 
Christ in the world. He then turned to the Eng- 
lish Church, speaking of it with enthusiasm as a 
Church of the true order, as in fact the Apostolic 
Church, having an organic life from^ the earliest 
times, and possessing the true signs of a primitive 
foundation of God : — but I will not continue this 
particular conversation, excepting to say that while 
abhorring schismatics of all denominations, he held 
strongly to the Methodist theory of reformations 
or revivals of religion. He went to the extreme 
lengths of the most earnest Methodist in this re- 
spect ; — indeed he seemed to be a mixture of 
Pusey and Wesley. Yet one word more as to his 
religious opinions — for the man and his conversa- 
tion awoke in me an absorbing interest. 

The English Prayer-Book, he considered, pre- 
supposed conversion, and the Sacraments fed the 
life begun at conversion. He was a stanch sacra- 
mentarian, but ever in a high and spiritual sense. 
He thought it to be his special work to convert the 
High Church party of England to a more spir- 
itual view of divine things ; and he had solemnly 
devoted to this work his two sons, noble young 
men, with one of whom I became acquainted, the 
other being in Scotland on a preaching tour, though 
still an undergraduate at Oxford. These self- 
denying preachers of righteousness coming up out 



420 OLD ENGLAND. 

of the desert and grasping the kingdom of Heaven 
with power, they were the ones who would shake 
England, and arouse her from her sins to a higher 
life. 

The next Sabbath morning I was awakened by 
the stentorian voices of the Cornwall miners, and 
of the humble people of his congregation, who were 
assembled in a lower room to pray ; and certainly 
such prayers I have never heard before or since. 
It was like the roaring of lions ; it was storming 
the throne of grace ; it was wrestling, pleading 
before the hills, agonizing, crying, almost shouting 
to God, that He might come and help them. — 
The little church where Divine service was held 
was built after the model of the one at Iona. Its 
bare white internal walls were decorated bv draw- 
ings roughly executed, though with some spirit, by 
young Puseyite clergymen, as Mr. A. told me, who 
had from time to time visited him ; — there were 
copies of Albrecht Diirer's " Christ in the Wil- 
derness ; " Ary Scheffer's " Christ rescuing the 
Lamb ; " Bruno's " St. Peter ; " &c. Texts of 
Scripture, and symbolical scrolls and ornaments, 
were also added, and the whole aspect of the 
church, the draped altar, the intoning of the Lit- 
urgy, the kneeling of the priest at the altar, were 
almost, if not quite, in the Roman Catholic fashion. 
Mr. A. preached two powerful sermons, the one 
in the morning upon t; the Marriage Supper,'' 
which feast, he said, was Spiritual Joy, of which 
all should strive to partake, and it was not Justi- 



LAND'S END. 421 

fication or Righteousness, which many would make 
of it. During the preaching in the afternoon, as 
the storm grew more furious without and the 
church more gloomy within, and the deep tones 
of the preacher's voice, rising sometimes into start- 
ling loudness, mingled with the tremendous blasts 
of the wind, and with the sobs and groans of 
the poor miners, who sometimes threw up their 
arms wildly into the air in the ecstasy of their 
emotion, — it was assuredly a strange and solemn 
scene. Mr. A., speaking of the church itself, 
called it the spiritual birthplace of many noble 
and distinguished persons ; and he pointed out the 
very seats they had occupied when their hearts 
were touched. He appeared to me a kind of Eng- 
lish Louis Harms, in his rugged individuality and 
imperious dogmatism, mingled as they were with 
deep, simple, primitive piety. He ruled his rocky 
vicarate at Land's End with a monarch's sway. 

The generous hospitality of Mr. A. and his family 
to myself, a perfect stranger, was something which 
seemed to me beautiful, and which I can never for- 
get. He is certainly a man whose earnestness and 
profound consecration to his Master's work cannot 
be doubted, if one cannot agree with him in all 
his views. He repudiates with scorn the idea of 
being considered to be the leader of a sect in the 
English Church, as there has been some attempt 
on the part of his admirers and disciples to make 
of him. But my good host was, I think, at fault 
in his confident estimate of the power of the High 



422 OLD ENGLAND. 

Church movement. Tractarianism has spent its 
force. At one time, inspired by the genius of New- 
man, the learning of Pusey, and the sweet music 
of Keble's song, it was mighty, but it has already 
had its day, and now lives only in the puerilities of 
Ritualism. That which was true in it has been 
dragged down and overwhelmed by that which 
was false. It has failed to Orientalize the English 
Church, or to change England into a happy mediaeval 
land, rejoicing in the sound of the convent bell. 
We would not say that it has done no good, but 
it has striven to set up the dead form of the Church, 
before the living Christ ; it has denied the rights 
of individual conscience and reason, and it cannot 
thus hope to control and lead English mind. The 
reaction of this, in the main untrue, though in some 
respects learned and refined ecclesiasticism mani- 
festing many traits of the noblest unselfishness, is 
rending anew the English Church, and armed 
powers, strong to contend against the truth, and 
the very life of the Christian faith, have sprung up 
from the sowing of the dragon's teeth. I believe, 
however, in the essential truth of Mr. A.'s idea of 
the visible unity of the Christian Church. The 
best minds in Christendom have always pleaded for 
unity ; but it is not in the form in which Mr. A. 
puts it. It is not in uniformity of order, government, 
or worship, but in this, that the true Church is the 
true brotherhood of man, and all who love Christ, 
who hold to the Head, shall love one another, and 
shall know one another, not theoretically and invis- 



LAND'S END. 423 

ibly, but visibly and openly ; they shall not oppose 
and wound each other ; they shall be as in the 
primitive times one in deed and truth, working to- 
gether with gladness to recover the world to God. 
" There is one body and one Spirit." This great 
truth is superior to Protestantism, or Catholicism, 
or any other Churchism. There is an ideal unity, 
toward which all should ever tend and strive, but 
that this ideal unity will ever be perfectly and 
concretely realized on earth, we have more doubt 
about, and can hardly believe. After all we would 
be chary to condemn the earnest strivings and 
methods of any who sincerely profess to love and 
serve Christ on earth ; and I must confess that the 
few " High Church " clergymen in whose society I 
have happened to be thrown, though I could not 
agree with them at all in their views, were person- 
ally by far the most scholar-like, refined, and inter- 
esting men of all the English clergymen whom I 
met. 

Having now reached the " Land's End " of 
England, both physical and spiritual, let us turn 
around and retrace our course northward, until in 
the neighborhood of Bristol we come upon our 
former steps, and thus will have completed the cir- 
cuit of this little land, — little in area, but vast 
in crowded interest and power. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 

From Exeter I crossed over to Barnstaple, on 
the North Devon coast, going from water to water, 
or from the river Exe to the Torridge, in about 
two hours. An old Cornish rebel once threatened 
to cut England through by a channel here, and to 
make South Devon and Cornwall an island ; this 
would have been a u Dutch Gap " with a ven- 
geance. But forty miles or less of canal, through 
a country presenting few difficulties, were no such 
great thing after all. The ride was through a 
thoroughly pastoral country, with great numbers 
of sheep and red Devon cattle feeding in the mead- 
ows. The first sight of the river, bridge, and tall 
tower of Barnstaple was pleasing ; and I found it 
to be a lively little town, with the invariable one 
long street, and the two hotels of the " Golden 
Lion " and the " Fortescue Amis," side by side, in 
spirited but harmonious rivalry. 

Bideforcl, eight miles and a half from Barnstaple, 
looked even now, as Kingsley has so vividly de- 
scribed it in his " Westward Ho ! " and I really 
seemed myself to have seen it before, and to have 
strolled on its long quay. It is one of those old 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 425 

gray sea-coast towns that do not essentially change, 
reminding one somewhat of Ayr in Scotland. The 
tide comes pouring in magnificently up the wide 
estuary of the Torridge River, and churning through 
the many-arched stone bridge, whose builders, ac- 
cording to the chronicler of Sir Amyas, gained 
from the good bishop Grandison of Exeter, " par- 
ticipation in all spiritual blessings forever." This 
famous bridge is an eighth of a mile long, with 
twenty-four arches, solid and without ornament. 
The town clusters in the form of an amphitheatre 
upon the steep hillside, from the summit of which 
is a wide river and sea-view ; and "one might easily 
fancy he saw in some ship melting into the bright 
sunset light, the good ship Hose, as she was setting 
forth on her long voyage to the golden regions of 
the Western Main. The river, the sea, the sun, 
all here say " Westward Ho ! " 

I rode to Clovellv, around through Yeovale, by 
" Northam Tower " and " Pebble Ridge," at 
which last place Ocean has done what Brunei could 
hardly have done under the same conditions, — 
built a straight wall of rounded pebble-stones, reg- 
ularly laid with a flat top, two miles long, which 
serves as an effectual bar to her encroachments, at 
the same time immovable and permeable, — " the 
labor of an age in piled stones." It is strange that 
this hint which Ocean has given of constructing 
sea-walls of round pebble or paving stones, simply 
heaped together in a compact form, has not been 
copied by man. 



426 OLD ENGLAND. 

The road to Clovelly was a flowery pathway, 
fringed with the sweet honeysuckle, and all varie- 
ties of ferns, the foxglove, the key-flox, the canker 
bramble, the blossoming furze, the wild straw- 
berry, and many other wild flowers and shrubs, that 
continually attract the attention by their beauty 
and profusion. And what splendid posting roads ! 
How smoothly we bowled along, up hill and down, 
passing farmers in their small wagons, driving with 
the same free rein, with an air of substance and 
solid independence about their whole establishment. 
As we rose upon the hills and neared the edge of 
the coast, fine views of the wide, foam-fringed ex- 
panse of Bideford Bay opened to us ; and I recall 
the view especially from " Buck's Cross," where 
the sight of the bright blue sea beyond the dark 
cliffs, gives that strong contrast of colors, which is 
peculiar to Devon. We turned into a private road 
called u The Hobby," which, as far as it goes, is 
the most beautiful in England, or indeed in the 
world. It runs for more than three miles along 
the edge of the cliffs, and through the oak forests 
with splendid sea-views, carpeted on either side 
by crimson heather-bells, crossing deep ravines 
wooded entirely down to the sea, and abounding 
in sharp angles and sudden glimpses of won- 
drous beauty, until the little village of Clovelly is 
reached, perched like a bird's-nest in the notch of 
the high sea-wall, to which one descends by a steep 
path, which is continued through the village to 
the shore by a flight of irregular, break-neck, 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 427 

i 

slippery steps. The woods hang darkly over this 
curious street, or crevice in the rocks, where these 
human " hanging-birds " have built their habita- 
tion. One can hear at night the song of the night- 
birds out of the dense forest overhead, and the 
roll of the sea far under one's feet. 

I stopped at the " Heart of Oak " Inn, and had 
a dinner of fine fresh fish and " clouted cream." 
I talked with the fishermen drying or mending 
their nets, along down the narrow rough street or 
"Jacob's Ladder " to the sea. One old " trawler" 
said to me, " It will be wet weather soon, sir ; we 
see the coast of Wales too clear." The view from 
the village stairs, of the sea, with the long, angular 
mass of " Lundy Island " blue in the distance, and 
the British Channel away even to the coast of 
Wales, is grand ; and the sight is equally fine from 
the sea-beach below, looking up at the huge wall- 
like precipices jutting out magnificently into the 
sea. I then walked to " Clovelly Court," anciently 
owned by the Cary family, and now in possession 
of Sir J. H. Williams. One enters it by the 
" Yellaries Gate " above the village, and the way 
is on the clean springy turf under the shadow of 
the oaks, through one of those noble and reposeful 
English parks from which all that is unsightly has 
been removed, and all that Nature has to do is, to 
grow more and more beautiful year by year, or, one 
might say, century by century. " Clovelly Court " 
itself is a substantial mansion, but nothing remark- 
able architecturally. In the old garden I asked 



428 OLD ENGLAND. 

permission to pluck two red roses, which I did in 
remembrance of Sir Amyas and of sweet Rose Sal- 
terne. Indeed it were useless to attempt to de- 
scribe this place, and the romantic region about, 
and above all the cliffs, that sweep up by long, 
green curves to the edge of the coast, and then 
break off by a sheer perpendicular descent of from 
five hundred to a thousand feet into the sea, and 
stand to receive the force of the Atlantic ; screen- 
ing behind their mighty barriers the loveliest, 
warmest, greenest vales and nooks ; for Kingsley, 
in his romance, which palpitates with the life and 
poetry of the great Elizabethan age, and also in that 
wonderftd piece of word-painting in " Fraser's " 
on " North Devon," has done this once for all, and 
has made this region his own forever, just as truly 
as Sir Walter Scott has set his signet upon Loch 
Lomond, and the highlands of Scotland. Others 
come and view these scenes as it were through 
them and by their grace. Genius makes all things 
it loves its own forever. I was shown among the 
woods, the house where Charles Kingsley lived as 
a boy, and was brought up to be a rover in these 
forests, exploring the sombre ravines, — haunts of 
the red deer, — fishing the streams, and delighting 
in this turbulent ocean that rolls beyond all. I 
cannot conceive of a fitter spot to nourish a poet. 
How different from meagre Haworth, or flat, 
marshy, uninteresting Olney ! One part of our 
ride back to Bideford was through a deep lane, 
where the bank and hedge on either side rose high 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 429 

above our heads, and the trees fairly overarched 
the narrow road. We passed the house of a Mr. 
Yeo of Appledore, now a successful retired mer- 
chant, who had once been a poor apprentice boy. 
Was he of the family of " Salvation Yeo " ? 

Ilfracombe is the North Devon Newport ; but it 
is more like Marblehead in Massachusetts, in its 
curious rocks and irregular formation. The moun- 
tainous rocks, black, twisted, upheaved, and knife- 
edged, inclose a small, square, completely land- 
locked harbor, where the masts of tiny craft lie 
thick together, and into which fumes the sturdy 
little coasting steamer, which, with the boats dart- 
ing around, make it a lively scene. 

The frowning hills about are sharply escarped, 
rugged, and broken. Off the rocks the water is 
deep sea-green, roaring and breaking with the full 
force of the open sea. There is one handsome 
villa across the harbor and a pretty modern stone 
church ; the houses cluster around wherever they 
can, dodging the rocks. A picturesque old light- 
house, which in ancient Catholic days was a shrine 
of St. Nicholas, is a resort of visitors. The " Cap- 
stan-road," as it is called, is a noble promenade, 
cut around the face of a high precipice, command- 
ing an expansive sea-view, and a bold coast-view 
of rugged and splintered rocks. Here ladies sit in 
snug corners, wrapped up in shawls, while young 
gentlemen, equally enveloped and comfortable, read 
aloud to them, like a veritable picture of John 
Leech. One could never tire of these rocks and 
this sea- view. 



430 OLD ENGLAND. 

The ride from Ufracombe to Lynton also abounds 
in fine views of the ocean opening suddenly be- 
tween the green hills : and never more than on 
this North Devon coast does one realize the beauty 
of the old British name of England — "the sea- 
defended green earth." The sea asserts here its 
personality — it makes itself felt as an element 
of Old England's character and history ; and 
it is everywhere present as a mighty and all- 
encircling power, holding England in its em- 
brace, claiming it as a child, and shaping by its 
ever-present influence the destiny of the English 
people. 

The road to Lynton is a lonely one, abounding 
in deep, short valleys, and, as one approaches the 
town, has a character of romantic wildness and 
beautv. 

Lynton, which is another much frequented place, 
is on the top of a huge green cliff, or, it might be 
called, mountain, while Lynmouth lies immediately 
below at the entrance of the gorge of the Lyn, 
where it empties into the sea. I walked down 
about the time of sunset into this gorge of the Lyn, 
where the sound of the little torrent mingles with 
the sea. The scenery here has been called by 
Southey " alpine." The vast bulk of the Lyn cliff, 
clad with gloomy firs at the base, caught the bronzed 
light of the setting sun, which came out at last 
with intense brightness, painting itself in the most 
gorgeous colors on the stormy clouds ; in front lay 
the wildlv tossing sea, softening somewhat as the 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 431 

sun went down, and toward the northwest was the 
opposite Welsh coast, growing fainter and fainter 
in the distance ; the strip of pebbly beach at the 
mouth of the river sparkled under the great red 
rock, and immediately beneath the cliff was moored 
a small vessel whose sail hanging idly also caught 
the deep crimson light ; fishing-stakes ran out into 
the water in a wide semi-circular sweep, and an old 
square marine tower completed the picture. 

This torrent of the Lyn is made of the streams 
of the East and West Lyn, which a little further 
back make a junction, forming the beautiful rapids 
of" Watersmeet," in the estate belonging to Lady 
Hemes. The water pouring over innumerable 
rocks, makes so many separate jets of milk-white 
foam, which is contrasted with the dark luxuriance 
of the overhanging trees, and the profusion of rich 
and delicate ferns ; every leaf is wet and polished ; 
rustic bridges here and there help you to ascend 
the wild little stream. I followed up the West 
Lyn for some way, until the gorge widens, and I 
came out under the great Lyn cliff, which on the 
west side of the stream is one dense mass of foliage. 
Here is a fine clear fall, and gray rocks strewed 
about, making the very temple of solitude and of 
natural beauty. On returning, one gets a glimpse 
of the sea, rimmed in between the sharp slopes of 
the ravine. 

I will not speak of other excursions which I 
made out of Lynton, further into the hills lying 
on the edge of the " Exmoor forest" region, and 



432 OLD ENGLAND. 

about the desolate rocks of this romantic coast ; but 
no one knows what English coast-scenery is until 
he has seen the North Devon shore. It is far bolder 
and grander than the opposite southern Devonshire 
coast, which is the usual resort of English tourists. 
The colors are richer, the cliffs higher and more 
grandly precipitous, the sea of a deeper ocean 
green, and all the forms of Nature are on a much 
larger scale. The hills pile up here in enormous 
parapets as they break off suddenly seaward, mak- 
ing a long wall of stupendous precipices. And yet 
the inland sides of these cliffs, as has been said, are 
beautifully rounded with steep slopes and vales of 
the richest green. The village of Lynton hangs 
suspended on one of these round steep hill-sides, 
and the view from the grounds of Castle Hotel is 
charming over the long sweeps of steeply sloping 
meadows dotted with neat white farm-houses. 

What is called the "North Walk" about the 
" Lyn-cliff " has been laid out with the boldest skill 
and taste. The walk winds around the face of the 
crag so perpendicular in places that if one should 
fall over he would sink I know not how many 
fathoms deep in the green ocean depths. The sea- 
gulls wheel fiercely about you as if you were an 
intruder in their solitary dominions, and there is 
nothing beyond or in sight but the lonely sea. 

There are some steep pitches in the road shortly 
after leaving Lynton up which one wonders how 
even spirited English coach-horses could ever drag 
a mail-coach. One passes over the huge slopes of 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 433 

the Exmoor hill region, abounding in sombre wooded 
ravines, with those wonderful glimpses of the sea 
every now and then at their narrow openings. The 
scenery about the valley of Porlock, in the neigh- 
borhood of the wild heathery forest region of 
" Dunkery Beacon " mountain, is peculiarly strik- 
ing. Dunster Castle is a picturesque village, with 
an ancient many-gabled market-house, and the 
castle embosomed in foliage. As we passed into 
Somersetshire the region grew broader and less 
picturesque, but was still very beautiful, with its 
green meadows and farm-lands. It is a rich agri- 
cultural region. This is the headquarters of the 
English gypsies ; we encountered a gypsy wagon 
and small encampment. We also met a large pack 
of hounds belonging to some gentleman of the neigh- 
borhood, on their way to or from the field. There 
were several " Podgers " and " Todgers " upon the 
coach in checked clothes and jockey hats, each with 
a little glass in the corner of his eye, and all very 
similar, the one to the other, who talked know- 
ingly of hounds and hunting ; but from something 
in the outer man, or the skeptical flings of Kingsley 
and the comical suggestions of Leech, one could 
not help having his suspicions about the profundity 
of their experience as bold followers of " St. Hu- 
bert," on the combes and wilds of Exmoor. 

At Bridgewater we struck the Exeter and Bris- 
tol Railway. At this town of Bridgewater, the 
unfortunate Duke of Monmouth was proclaimed 
king, and met his defeat at Sedgmoor, three miles 

28 



434 OLD ENGLAND. 

distant. A little higher up I took the branch road 
off to Glastonbury and Wells. 

The city of Wells, which we now visit, has a ro- 
mantic situation on the southern slope of Mendip 
Hills, twenty miles equi-distant from Bath, Bristol, 
and Bridgewater. It takes its name from the an- 
cient well dedicated to St. Andrew, which rises 
within the Episcopal grounds, and runs through 
the city down the sides of the principal streets in 
clear sparkling streams. 

There is no place which, taken altogether, pre- 
serves a more antique air of tranquil seclusion than 
Wells. In the precincts of Chester Cathedral, and 
at many other points in England, there broods the 
same antique calm, but here the whole place is per- 
vaded by this reposeful spirit of the past ; and this 
culminates in the neighborhood of St. Andrews' 
Cathedral, the Bishop's palace, the old moat, the 
conventual buildings, and the three venerable gates, 
or " eyes," as they are called, of the Cathedral 
yard. The moat about the Bishop's palace, over- 
hung by a thick curtain of aged elms mingled with 
ivy, growing like a warrior's crest upon the high 
turreted interior walls, and reflected in deep shadows 
in the smooth dark mirror of the water, has a thor- 
oughly feudal look, which is heightened by the 
drawbridge over the moat, and the frowning castel- 
lated gateway. How strange the state of society 
when a Christian bishop lived in such jealously 
armed seclusion, behind moated walls and embat- 
tled towers ! What a commentary, this very name 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 435 

of "the close!" One of these old bishops was 
himself a famous fighting character, who, at the 
age of sixty-four, commanded the king's artillery 
at the battle of Sedgmoor. Among the bishops of 
Bath and Wells were Thomas Wolsey, William 
Laud, Thomas Kerr, and George Hooper. Bishop 
Beckington seems to have been the great architect- 
ural benefactor of the city itself. He built the two 
great gateways, the Bishop's palace, the " Pennyless 
Porch," which still bears his arms of the beacon and 
tun, and the market hall, in which the infamous 
Jeffries sat, and pronounced sentence upon the 
wretched followers of the defeated Duke of Mon- 
mouth. Within the quiet area of the " Bishop's 
close " are the ruined and lordly remains of the 
" Old Hall." One tall, slender, turreted fragment 
stands entirely by itself, and is wound tightly around 
by the clasping arms of the ivy that strive to hide 
its loneliness and decay. In the garden are shrubs 
and trees of" curling acacia," " Glastonbury thorn," 
cypress, and Turkish oak ; while great clumps of 
lilies perfamed the air. The view from the walls 
of the broad meadows in front of the "close" 
on which cattle were feeding, and laborers making 
hay, and the green wavy Mendip Hills with the 
Glastonbury Tor and the Dalcot Hill in the distance, 
was more than prettily English and rural, — it was 
beautiful, in the rich light of that glowing autumn 
afternoon. And there, too, near by, were the three 
great square towers and the ornamented bulk of the 
Cathedral. 



436 OLD ENGLAND. 

The Cathedra] of St. Andrew was built upon the 
site of a still more ancient church founded by Ina, 
king of the West Saxons in 704. It also goes 
back to a remote antiquity, for its choir and nave 
were rebuilt in the middle of the twelfth century. 
The central tower, which is the noblest and most 
finished part of the structure, is of the early Eng- 
lish style to the roof ; the upper part is of the Dec- 
orated, with a mixture of the early Perpendicular 
styles. It has an elegant appearance from its rich 
pinnacles, and is of a softened and gray tint. Be- 
ginning to show signs of sinking, it was raised in 
the fourteenth century, and was strengthened by 
the introduction beneath it of inverted buttressing 
arches, which give to the interior a strange effect. 
These arches, architecturally considered, are un- 
doubtedly blemishes, but they are on such a vast 
scale, and so bold in their forms, and yet so simple, 
that they do not take away from the plain gran- 
deur of the interior. They are quite Oriental or 
Saracenic. The top of the eastern window is seen 
bright and glowing over the lower part of the upper 
arch. The west front, two hundred and thirty- 
five feet in length, has two square towers, with a 
central screen terminated by minarets, and is di- 
vided into distinct compartments of eight project- 
ing buttresses ; all of these projections and recessed 
parts are covered with rich sculpture and statu- 
ary, of which there are one hundred and fifty-three 
figures of life-size, and more than four hundred 
and fifty smaller figures. In the nine ascending 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 437 

tiers of sculpture pieces, one may trace, it is said, 
the successive order of subjects in the " Te Deum t 
of St. Ambrose : " The glorious company of the 
apostles praise Thee. The goodly army of the 
prophets praise Thee. The noble army of mar- 
tyrs praise Thee," &c. The last tiers end with 
the representation of the Resurrection and Final 
Judgment. These statues, contemporaneous with 
the time of Nicholas Pisano, and the early pre- 
raphaelite artists, have the same purity and eleva- 
tion of expression, and the same simple unadorned 
majesty, that belong to that period of sacred art. 
It was an earnest, childish, but sublime way of 
praising God, by attempting thus, step by step, 
with laborious and unw r earied effort, to carve in en- 
during stone the ascending plan of human redemp- 
tion. Let us not deride this simple expression of 
ancient faith which served doubtless for ages to help 
ignorant minds to spell out Divine truth on this 
great rough stone primer, while the living Word of 
God was kept from the people through misplaced 
awe, or worse, spiritual despotism. The doors of 
this magnificent west front are universally consid- 
ered to be too small, and this is the chief fault 
of the building. The other most striking features 
of Wells Cathedral are the Chapter House and 
the Ladye Chapel. The first of these, on the rear 
of the church, is an octagonal structure with pin- 
nacled buttresses at each angle. It is approached 
from the interior by a worn staircase of twenty 
steps of noble architectural design. Among the 



438 OLD ENGLAND. 

grotesque carvings that line the staircase, I remem- 
ber in particular one queer old figure with a staff, 
or rather crutch, thrust in a dragon's mouth, sup- 
porting a column. While thus holding up the Ca- 
thedral with his head and hand above, and choking 
a writhing dragon beneath, he looks smiling and 
unconcerned as if it were an e very-day affair with 
him, as indeed it is. The whole church abounds in 
these old sculptures, little demoniac figures with big 
heads, faces with enormous fish mouths, old men 
with packs on their backs, and angels with huge 
armfuls of flowers. They seem to let one into the 
interior chambers of fancy, the imaginative work- 
ings of the human mind in the dark ages. All these 
forms and faces, even to the stern " gargoyles " on 
the roof, have a simple earnestness, as if they were 
not meant to be frivolous or irreverent, but were the 
glimpses of natural fancies, protesting doubts, vain 
fears and poetic hopes, thrusting themselves through 
the awful rigid system of religious terrorism under 
which the mind was crushed. I have no doubt the 
carvers and masons worked on each according to 
his own mind, without much definite guidance or 
pattern-drawing from the superior architect, except 
in the general plan. Here one man has left the 
record of his remorse, and another of his aspiration, 
and another of his homely English wit and shrewd 
common-sense morality. The Chapter House is 
unexcelled for splendor, lightness, and simple maj- 
esty. From the central clustered column spring 
the series of intricate but harmonious traceried lines 



NORTH DEVON AND WELLS. 439 

of the ceiling, each meeting in the ball-flower orna- 
ment overhead. 

From its eight painted windows, this room is 
flooded with richly colored lights. The Ladye 
Chapel affords a fine perspective of pillars near its 
entrance, though it is not so remarkable as the 
Chapter House for beauty and boldness. The ceil- 
ing is newly gilded, and the choir, too, has a fresh 
new look with its modern tiles and brasses. 

Wells Cathedral, on the whole, is distinguished 
for a dignified but rich simplicity, arising from its 
plain large surfaces, mingled and edged here and 
there with fine-cut and elegant ornamentation. 
The court and buildings of the Wells Theological 
College have a thoroughly quaint, old-fashioned 
look, quiet, rigid, and mediaeval ; as if the students 
reared there could not but be Churchmen of the 
" brother Ignatius " stamp, gentlemen, scholars, and 
— priests. I cannot leave Wells without speaking 
of the two splendid " cedars of Lebanon " stand- 
ing in the environs of the church. They are not 
very tall, but they sweep the ground majestically, 
and grow in a series of broad heavy masses of foli- 
age, gracefully undulating in their outline. Would 
that I might carry away from this ancient city and 
from its noble temple of Praise, something of the 
high and angelical spirit which is breathed in the 
good Bishop Ken's familiar " morning hymn : " — 

" Awake, lift up thyself, mj' - heart, 
And with the angels bear thy part, 
Who all night long unwearied sing 
High praises to th' eternal King. 



440 OLD ENGLAND. 

" Lord, I my vows to Thee renew : 
Scatter my sins as morning dew ; 
Guard my first springs of thought and will, 
And with Thyself my spirit fill. 

" Direct, control, suggest this day, 
All I design, or do, or say ; 
That all my powers, with all their might, 
In Thy sole glory may unite.'' 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 

We come now to the legendary portion of Old 
England, where it is enveloped in the dim mists 
of mingled ecclesiastical and heroic fables. The 
region about Glastonbury is the seat of the earliest 
traditions of the English Church, going back almost 
to apostolic days ; and with these, the armed heroic 
forms of King Arthur and his " Knights of the 
Round Table," are strangely blended, with half 
childish and half poetic glory upon the picture. 

Glastonbury meant originally, it is said, " Isle 
of the Glassy Water ; '' and it was also called 
"Avalon," or " Avilion," thus alluded to by Ten- 
nyson in the " Morte d' Arthur : " — 

" To the island-valley of the Avilion ; 
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow. 
Nor ever wind blows loudly ; but it lies 
Deep-meadowed, happy, fair with orchard-lawns, 
And bowery hollows, crowned with summer sea." 

To this peaceful Eden of rest King Arthur was 
gently borne over the lake, after his grievous 
wound in fighting with the traitor ; and, lost for 
ages to the sight of men, he is here at length to 
reappear among men, for the glory of his native 
land. 



442 OLD ENGLAND. 

Here, in all probability, was really the scene of 
the earliest home of Christianity in England, al- 
though myth and fable make it difficult to come at 
the truth of history. 

The story is, that while Glastonbury was still an 
island, hidden amid the marshes and thickets of a 
vast morass, a company of pilgrims from the Holy 
Land, led by " Joseph of Arimathea," landed on 
the western shore of England, somewhere in North 
Wales ; and journeying on south, through the wild 
and rugged land, they at length stopped here, and 
established themselves as a religious community. 
Mrs. Jameson thus relates the legend : " Some 
hold that when Philip, one of the twelve Apostles, 
came to France, he sent Joseph of Arimathea with 
Joseph his son, and eleven more of his disciples 
hither, who with great zeal and undaunted courage 
preached the true and lively faith of Christ, and 
when King Arviragus considered the difficulties 
that attended their long and dangerous journey 
from the Holy Land, beheld their civil and inno- 
cent lives, and observed their sanctity and the 
severities of their religion, he gave them a certain 
island in the west part of his dominions for their 
habitation, called Avalon, containing twelve hides 
of land, where they built a church of wreathen 
wands, and set a place apart for the burial of their 
servants. These holy men were devoted to a 
religious solitude, confined themselves to the num- 
ber of twelve, lived there after the manner of 
Christ and his Apostles, and by preaching con- 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 443 

verted a great number of the Britons who became 
Christians." 

Joseph planted his staff as a sign that they had 
reached a place of fixed abode after their weary 
wanderings ; the staff immediately took root, and 
like Aaron's rod budded and flowered. The vis- 
itor is still shown stocks descended from the " Holv 
Thorn " of Joseph of Arimathea, which is said to 
differ from the common hawthorn but in one re- 
spect, that it blossoms amid the snows of winter 
at Christmas time ! 

Succeeding the humble wattled dwellings of the 
earliest missionaries, and the ruder Saxon struct- 
ures, at length a great abbey arose, one of the 
most complete, wealthy, and famous in all Eng- 
land, as its present ruins amply testify. It was in 
its prime a religious establishment of magnificent 
power and riches. It acknowledged no jurisdiction 
to Home, but looked solely to its own metropolitan 
bishop of Caerdon-on-Uske, claiming that its au- 
thority was derived direct from the Holy Land 
and the Apostles. The remains of its edifices, for 
solidity and majesty, are assuredly unsurpassed by 
any of the ruined abbeys of England. Tintern 
Abbey is more beautiful, and Fountains Abbey 
has possibly more of its walls still standing, but 
Glastonbury Abbey is superior to all in massive 
grandeur. Some of its walls are very high and 
solid still. The original church, whose outlines 
are distinctly marked, measured from the end of 
St. Joseph's Chapel on the west, to the Retro or 



444 OLD ENGLAND. 

Ladye ChapeL on the east, is five hundred and 
ninety-four feet in length. Two of the piers which 
supported the central tower of the nave are stand- 
ing, with parts of the great arch, towering ragged 
and weed-fringed against the sky. There is some 
beautiful carving of oak leaves about one of the 
side-doors of the choir. The walls of " St. Joseph's 
Chapel " are almost entire, — strong Norman work 
of the time of Henry II. at the end of the twelfth 
century. Two of the small square towers that 
stood at the angles are still almost perfect. With 
their vertical lines and pyramidal pinnacles, they 
have an elegant look. The exterior walls of the 
chapel, with their simple round mullioned windows, 
projecting piers, and vertical side lines, ending in 
bow-kneed intersecting arches, together with the 
deeply recessed and rich portal adorned with the 
chevron moulding, have that austere majesty which 
despises feeble external ornament, and which is so 
characteristic of the masculine Norman style. 

Many kings were buried here, — the grandfather 
of Constantine the Great, Edmund the First, Ed- 
gar and Edmund Ironsides ; and here, if ancient 
chronicles are true, King Arthur himself was 
buried. Camden says that Arthur's tomb was dis- 
covered with a leaden tablet above it in the shape 
of a cross, with this inscription : — " Hie jacet se- 
pultus Rex Arthurus in insula Avaloniag." An- 
other English chronicler (Fabyan's Chronicle, p. 
81,) gives this account of his death and burial : — 
" Whenns relacion came to Arthur of all this trea- 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 445 

son wrought by his neuewe Mordred, he in all 
haste made towarde Brytaine, as it is redde in the 
Englysshe Crony cle, and landed at Sandwyche, 
wiiere he was mette of Mordred and his people, 
which gaue vnto hym stronge batyll in tyme of his 
landyng, and loste there many of his knyghtes, as 
the famous knyght Garvain and others ; but yet 
this notwithstandynge Arthure at length wonne 
the lande, and chaysed his enemyes, and after the 
enteryng of his cosyn Gawyn and other of his 
knyghtes there slayne, he sette forwarde his hoost 
to pursue his enemyes. Mordred thus beying 
ouerst of his vncle at the see side, withdrew hym 
to Wynchester, where he beying furnysshed of 
newe sowdyours, gaue vnto Arthure, as saith Gau- 
fride, the second fyght ; wherein also Mordred 
was put to the worse and constrayned to flee. 
Thirdly and lastly, the sayd Mordred faught with 
his vncle Arthure beside Glastynberry, where after 
a longe and daugerous fyght Mordred was slayne, 
and the victoryous Arthure wounded vnto the 
deth, and after buryed in the vale of Aualon, be- 
side Glastynberry beforesaid." 

This same chronicler thus speaks of his exploits : 
" Arthure faught xii. notable bataylles agayn the 
Saxons, and of theym all was victoure. This noble 
warayour, as wytnesseth holy Gilda, slewe with his 
owne hande in one daye, by the helpe of oure Lady 
Seynt Mary, whose Picture he bare peynted on 
his shelde, c. and. xi. Saxons ; whiche shelde he 
called Pridwen, his sworde was called Caliboure, 



446 OLD ENGLAND. 

and his spere was called Rone after the Brettysshe 
tunge or speche." 

Still another old writer, Geraldus Cambrensis, 
speaks with great particularity of the opening of 
Arthur's tomb in the reign of Henry II. ; the cof- 
fin itself was made of the hollowed trunk of a tree ; 
the bones were of great size ; and the skull bore 
marks of the fatal wound. In 1189, the tradition 
is, that the tomb of Queen Guinever was also 
opened, and that her yellow hair, nicely braided, 
was found unchanged. True or false, these tradi- 
tions are exceedingly interesting, and seem to give 
some ground of substance to the shadowy legend- 
ary age of England's British kings. Nowhere are 
the myths more beautiful, nowhere more simply 
heroic, nowhere more sweetly tinged with the ro- 
seate light of a dawning Christianity, before wh\ch 
the gloom of Drnidic Paganism was beginning to 
flee away, than those which cluster about Glaston- 
bury, and this ancient vale of Avalon. In these 
walls, King Arthur with his " pendragon-crest," 
often entered, weary and worn from " roving the 
trackless realms of Lyonesse." Here he was met 
and entertained with solemn ceremonies, grave 
courtesy, and learned discourse of holy men, telling 
him of more glorious wars, and of the way to win 
a higher crown. So, at least, we will think. Yes, 
to us, Arthur is "flos regum gloria regni." Other 
great kings and heroes there have been, but he it 
was who founded the mighty Table : — 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 447 

" But I was first of all the kings who drew 
The knighthood- errant of this realm and all 
The realms together under me, their Head, 
In that fair order of my Table Round, 
A glorious company, the flower of men, 
To serve as model for the mighty world 
And be the fair beginning of a time. 
I made them lay their hands in mine and swear 
To reverence the King, as if he were 
Their conscience, and their conscience as their King, 
To break the heathen and uphold the Christ, 
To ride abroad redressing human wrongs, 
To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it, 
To lead sweet lives in purest chastity, 
To love one maiden only, cleave to her, 
And worship her by years of noble deeds, 
Until they won her ; for indeed I knew 
Of no more subtle master under Heaven 
Than is the maiden passion for a maid 
Not only to keep down the base in man, 
But teach high thought and amiable words, 
And courtlinesse and the desire of fame, 
And love of truth, and all that makes a man." 

A figure far more distinct and no less powerful, 
though of an earthlier and more passionate mould, 
is the formidable shape of St. Dunstan, who lived 
in the reign of King Athelstane, grandson of Al- 
fred, in the tenth century. He was a monk of 
Glastonbury Abbey. In his lonely cell, his harp, 
touched by invisible fingers for his solace, breathed 
the hymn, " Gaudete animi." He also (so goes 
the ancient chronicle) once heard the angels sing, 

" Peace to the lande of Englysshemen." 

He had moreover at Glastonbury his famous tussle 
with the arch-fiend, and by a sharp cauterizing pro- 
cess quickly routed him. He rebuked kings boldly 



448 OLD ENGLAND. 

for their vices, and brandished before the unsubmis- 
sive the lightnings of the Church. He was ora- 
tor, poet, artist, painter, skillful artificer in metals, 
making great improvements and additions to the 
organ. He became Primate of the English nation, 
and died in Canterbury, a. d. 988. 

Glastonbury Abbey was a Benedictine brother- 
hood. The Benedictines, the best of all the mo- 
nastic orders, established themselves in England 
about fifty years after the death of their founder in 
543. Oddly enough, nothing now survives to tes- 
tify to their higher virtues or more important 
achievements, but the Abbot's Kitchen, a singu- 
lar structure with high octagonal, pyramidal roof, 
crowned with a double lanthorn, and the Abbot's 
Stable, with some interesting carvings still clinging 
to it ; these are the only buildings that now remain 
entire. In the kitchen are four huge fire-places at 
the four angles. Pigs and cattle roam unmolested 
about it, and sometimes go grunting into it, troubled 
with no sense of alarm, or with ghosts of ancestral 
martyrdoms. 

I went to the summit of Tor Hill, a remarkable 
eminence of steep rounded green, surmounted by 
the tower of ruined St. Michael's Church. Upon 
this hill the last abbot of Glastonbury, Abbot Whit- 
ing, was hung for resisting the authority of Henry 
VIII. ; and the proud Abbey of Glastonbury, with 
other great religious houses, fell with him. At the 
foot of this hill is a mineral spring, now almost 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 449 

choked up and deserted, which was celebrated for 
its healing qualities from the earliest antiquity. To 
this venerable spring, according to Hollingshed, 
King Arthur was brought to be healed of his 
wounds ; and during the greatness of the monas- 
tery for ages, the sick from all parts of the king- 
dom resorted hither for cure. 

In this region of Somersetshire, wandering amid 
its woods and caves, a veritable royal hero, who 
belongs to authentic history, the English Alfred, 
spent the days of his darkness and exile when 
he was driven from his throne by the Danes. 
Legends also cluster about him. One day in the 
depths of a forest, while his scanty followers were 
absent in search of food, as he was engaged in 
reading a book, a pilgrim met him, and asked alms 
of him in God's name. The king lifted up his 
hands toward heaven and said, " I thank God, who 
of His grace assisteth this poor man this day by an- 
other poor man." He then called his only remain- 
ing servant, who had but one loaf and a little sip 
of wine, and bade him give half to the poor man. 
This poor man partook of the refreshment and sud- 
denly vanished. The night following, the same 
man appeared to him in a vision clad in full bish- 
op's robes, and said : "I am Cuthbert, the pilgrim 
to whom yesterday you gave both bread and wine. 
I am busy for thee. Remember this of me when 
it shall be well with thee. To-morrow T strong help- 
ers shall come to thee ; by w T hose help thou shalt 
subdue thine enemies." This was the same Saint 

29 



450 OLD ENGLAND. 

Cuthbert, to whom Alfred afterward gave posses- 
sions in land and money, for the founding of Dur- 
ham Church, which was dedicated to this saint. 
Shortly after this event men flocked to Alfred from 
the regions round about. He himself entered the 
Danish camp in the garb of a minstrel, discovered 
the weak points of his enemy, and with his little 
host of Somersetshire, Wiltshire, and Dorsetshire 
men, routed the Danes in battle, and began his 
victorious course to the recovery of his kingdom. 1 
Alfred's division of time is worthy of our contem- 
plation at this day. He divided the day and night 
into three parts, if not interrupted by war or busi- 
ness. Eight hours he spent in study ; the other 
eight he spent in prayer and deeds of charity ; and 
the other eight hours he spent in sleep, nourish- 
ment of his body, and the affairs of his realm. 
This order he kept by waxen tapers tended by 
persons appointed for this purpose. 

Returning to Brido-ewater, I went from thence 
on to Bristol to spend the Sabbath. I attended 
divine service the next day, as I had done many 
months before, at the " Brethren Chapel " of 
Messrs. Miiller and Craik, in a neat but unpre- 
tending stone edifice, very plain within, with broad 
galleries occupied mostly by the children of the 

1 The familiar story of the spoiled cakes belongs also to this place 
and period. The old Latin verse in which it is embalmed has been 
translated into genuine Somersetshire dialect : — 

" Cam thee mind the keaks, man, an doosen zee 'em burn, 
I 'm boun thee 's eat 'em vast enough az soon az tiz the turn." 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 451 

" House of Faith," dressed simply, but not in a 
manner to make them look so distressingly plain, 
as does the homely uniform of some English be- 
nevolent institutions. Mr. Craik the preacher, the 
" alter ego " of Muller, a man with a fine intellect- 
ual face, spoke extemporaneously to a devout con- 
gregation, all following his Scriptural allusions in 
their Bibles, and all singing fervently together. 
Mr. Craik's sermon was upon " Joseph, as the 
type of Christ." No type, he said, was an exact 
counterpart of what it typified, but presented con- 
trasts as well as correspondences. He dwelt upon 
one of these contrasts in particular, that Jacob 
did not know what would befall his son when he 
sent him forth on his errand ; nor did Joseph 
himself know what was in the future when he 
went to seek his brethren in the wilderness with 
a message of peace ; but our Almighty Father 
knew perfectly, and still ordained in love, what 
would befall his Son, when he went forth from his 
bosom to suffer for the redemption and peace of 
men. In the course of his remarks he had occa- 
sion to speak of each event of life, the most minute, 
being under the guidance of God. Here his faith 
broke out in an earnest and elevated strain. He 
represented all things as bound together in one 
framework of harmony ; that the smallest part 
had its place and fitness in a mighty whole of ar- 
chitectural order and magnificence ; every thing 
touched upon, balanced, and sustained its neighbor, 
in this great plan of God which soared far out of 



452 OLD ENGLAND. 

our feeble sight. In every trial and temptation let 
us remember this, and the time would come when 
we should see the order and the perfection of the 
finished whole. His language was plain and nat- 
ural, adapted to the understanding of children. I 
heard no finer single sermon in England, more orig- 
inal, beautiful, or spiritual. It is pleasant to me to 
carry away from a foreign land these mementos, 
these golden fragments. They seem precious be- 
cause we have gathered them on another soil, and 
found the same truth at Athens, at Rome, in Eng- 
land, in America. 

The Communion Service was administered in the 
simplest way, and was not overstrained but affec- 
tionate and free, without losing its sacredness. A 
brother arose after the communion, and recalling 
two or three of the most affecting parts of the dis- 
course, gave out a hymn. Mr. Craik then spoke 
of a woman who had died the previous week, draw- 
ing with a few happy strokes a fine Christian char- 
acter, and then asked all to unite in prayer to 
thank God that he had given his faithful one rest 
and the crown. There was, as it seemed to me, 
something of the simplicity of the old apostolic 
times, in all the services ; no scenic effects, but a 
true Christian pastor feeding the people with the 
bread of life, and finding a loving response to every 
word he spoke in the faces of his flock, especially 
in those of the children. The Spirit of Christ was 
surely in that place. 

I have had the privilege of joining in prayer and 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 453 

praise with all kinds of Christians, with High and 
Low Churchmen, with German Lutherans, with 
Moravians and " Plymouth Brethren," with Ameri- 
can Methodists, with Independents and Baptists, 
with Irvingites and those who look for the second 
coming of Christ, with Quakers and Roman Cath- 
olics, with Greek and Armenian Christians, with 
men of many different languages and races, with 
Copts and Syrians, with some whom I consider in 
the main errorists, and I mav sav that with much 
of human vanity and error in them all, I have 
found in all that in which I could heartily unite, 
and more real piety and faith than I was worthy to 
participate in ; and I will enjoy the thought, that 
there is more of the Spirit of Christ on earth than 
many good men think ; more of the truth of the 
one living Lord sown deep in the sorrowful hearts 
of men, which shall at some time spring up in im- 
mortal light from the dark earth. Let us at least 
so hope. 

Mr. Miiller preached in the afternoon a dis- 
course upon the 5th chapter of Luke. He gave 
great life to the explanation of Scripture. He was 
a rich and thoughtful exegete. " Depart from me, 
for I am a sinful man," was an expression, he said, 
not of true faith. The good man, Peter, learned 
better afterward. The Saviour pushed off in a 
boat from the shore in order to be better heard. 
He did not do a miracle when it was unnecessary. 
The net brake, but it was only to denote the mul- 
titude of fishes, not to show that any should be lost. 



454 OLD ENGLAND. 

The disciples caught nothing before, because they 
did not work under the direction of Jesus ; they 
did not put down where he commanded. Every 
occupation, plan, and work of man, to be truly 
successful, must be done under the direction of 
Christ, in union with his will, from love to him, 
depending upon his power. Nothing was too small 
for this, not even fishing. How much more in 
trying to do good to the poor, ignorant, and 
vile, — in trying to be fishers of men. 

The most careless must have been struck with 
the calm and transparent purity of his thoughts ; 
they seemed to flow forth from a heart that was 
in union with God's Spirit and Word. 

Chepstow, in Monmouthshire, near the mouth 
of the Wye, just across the head of the British 
Channel from Bristol, is the starting-point for tour- 
ists who visit Tintern Abbey, and other points 
of interest in this lovely part of Wales. It is a 
neat town picturesquely situated on the abrupt 
bank of the river, with the ruined castle of the 
famous Clare and Pembroke families still tower- 
ing above it, though now but a mere shell and 
shadow of its former strength. Strongbow, Earl 
of Pembroke, was the real founder of this family, 
and was the first Englishman who succeeded in 
making permanent conquest in Ireland. He made 
himself for a while an independent monarch of a 
considerable portion of Ireland, and ruled by the 
right of the stronger. 

The castle wears even now a massive and defi- 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 455 

ant look, somewhat in the Alnwick Castle style, 
especially its frowning front, flanked by two lofty 
towers. The chapel, in almost utter ruins, has 
still some good carving. A little to the west of the 
castle there is a noble view of the valley of the 
Wye, and of the curve of the river holding in its 
arm the beautiful Piercefield estate, with its ro- 
mantic scenery and walks. In this castle one of 
the regicide judges, Harry Marten, was confined 
twenty years ; and Jeremy Taylor was, for a short 
time, kept here as prisoner of state. One of its 
lords in the time of the wars of the Rebellion, — a 
man of thought in those times of action, — was the 
Earl of Worcester, who w T as the author of " The 
Century of Scantlings," and whose original and 
penetrative genius anticipated many of the most 
important inventions of modern times. 

The scenery of the Wye, though not so bold as 
some regions, is to my mind as lovely as any to be 
found in England, and indeed in some respects it is 
of surpassing loveliness. The rugged grandeur 
of the Welsh mountain landscape is here quite 
softened down, but it still forms a high and shad- 
owy background of the picture. The wooded hills 
on either side are of lofty rounded forms breaking 
off in high cliffs upon the stream, though here and 
there receding and affording space for broad green 
meadows along the banks of the river, which winds 
with rapid flow among the hills, solitary and yet 
not lonely. 

The scenery of England, compared with that of 



456 OLD ENGLAND. 

Italy, has been rightly called " sober," but it is a 
soberness in which there are touches and gleams 
of high ornamental beauty. It is like the soberness 
of a Doric temple with its decorated frieze and in- 
tervals of rich exquisite sculpture. This delicious 
scenery of the Wye, with here and there in every 
part of the kingdom such little silver-footed streams 
as the Dove, the Wharfe, the Trent, the Fowey, 
the Tamar, the waving and gentle outline of the 
hills, the unparalleled sheen of the grass, the bright 
northern lakes and the bosky combes of Devon- 
shire, and everywhere the low cottage and village 
church hid in foliage and flowers, with the gray 
ruin clothed in green, and now and then a great 
park of venerable oaks, some of them a thou- 
sand years old, with sweeping glades of clean- 
est and smoothest lawn, and thrown about all a 
delicate veil of continual mist that softens and 
heightens each noble feature, — this makes Old 
England a strong and chaste home of freemen, a 
beautiful northern temple, which we would ever 
honor as the home and shrine of our ancestral 
virtue. 

There are few villages upon the banks of the 
Wye, but there is everywhere a charming rural 
sweetness and quietness, with great variety of 
scenery, — now broad stretches of shining river 
reflecting the tinted woods, and now narrow vales 
embosomed in high walls of richest green. The 
view from Wyndcliff rock is indeed something 
more than simply beautiful ; and, as an exceptional 
feature, it merits almost the epithet of sublime. 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 457 

It commands a view of nine counties. Nearly a 
thousand feet below is the rushing stream, with the 
rich vale and lovely Piercefield meadows, and at a 
distance to the south and west clear across the 
Gloucestershire peninsula the sea-like Severn is 
seen high on the horizon, as if it were suspended 
midway in the heavens ; while to the north are 
rolling hill and thick forest, and the dim mountains 
of Glamorganshire. The scene has been called 
tropical, as if it were upon some great African 
river with its vast stretches of distance. This is 
partly just. There is certainly something pecul- 
iarly magnificent both in its land and water pros- 
pect. It forms a splendid introduction, or natural 
frontispiece, to the pensive glories of Tintern 
Abbey. 

This fine ruin stands in a valley, or nearly at 
the foot of a side hill, at a curve of the river. Its 
situation is beautiful, and it appears far more per- 
fect at a distance than it really is, for it is in fact 
but the vast frame of a building, rather than a 
building itself. It is now a temple wholly open to 
the elements, and paved with the greensward. 
Four of its high sharp-pointed gables remain, over 
and around which the ivy has gathered in opulent 
profusion. Indeed, nowhere, with the exception 
of Kenilworth, have I seen such an enormous 
growth of ivy, such huge knots and tree-like 
trunks, resembling the clustered pillars that they 
climb up, sending out their serpentine arms that 
wind over the loftiest wall, and hold the whole 



458 OLD ENGLAND. 

ruin in tight embrace. Especially about the in- 
terior north window, and the west end on the 
outside, are great masses of ivy, bulging and pend- 
ulous, covering entirely with folds of dark drapery 
the rugged sides of the old masonry. The ivy has 
left, or been trained to leave, the noble west 
window clear, so that its delicately traceried lines 
stand out in relief against the sky. The carving 
here and there is as sharp as if done yesterday. In 
the open nave, of two hundred and twenty-eight 
feet in lenffth. most of the clustered columns are 
standing, and the two east and west windows, twice 
as large as the windows of Melrose Abbey, and 
nearly perfect in their stone-work, make one mourn 
that so much is left, and yet that all is hopeless 
ruin. 

But, as I have said before, these old English 
abbeys could not be more beautiful in their prime 
than in their decay. Nature has claimed them 
and tried all her art to possess them entirely. She 
has wound her mantle about them, and hung her 
banners over them, as if to say, " Though man has 
left you I make you mine, and adorn you with 
my best." The broken shadows of window, sharp 
peak, and jagged wall, the immense fragments of 
columns and masonry, the massive drapery of ivy, 
the long architectural perspectives of nave and cross 
aisles, the sombre recesses, the gleams of pathetic 
beauty in this stern decay, the tender blue sky 
above and the green natural turf beneath, the 
spirit of repose that breathes through this desolate 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 459 

abode of an older faith, form a poem of subtle 
power. 

One of the gems of the building is the door of 
the cloisters on the left of the north aisle, its 
wonderfully preserved mouldings showing what 
Tintern Abbey once was. It was a monastery of 
the Cistercian or White Monks, founded by Walter 
de Clare, a relation of the Conqueror, in 1132, in 
expiation, it is said, of great crimes and a wicked 
life. Probably most, if not all, of the present 
structure was erected later, by Roger Bigod, Earl 
of Norfolk, in the last part of the thirteenth 
century. 

Tintern Abbey is, by the road, five miles from 
Chepstow, and about the same distance from Mon- 
mouth. 

In the town-house at Monmouth stands the 
statue of Henry V., and in the ruined castle near 
by he was born. This is one of the worst pre- 
served ruins in the kingdom. When I saw it, it 
was used as a vegetable store-house, and part of it 
was a pigsty. There was a pile of dirty straw in 
the grand fire-place, and heaps of turnips in another 
recess. But it is still a formidable looking old 
Norman keep, with a water-gate on the river. 

St. Thomas' Church, while small in size, yet 
with its recessed doorway, round windows, and 
curious diamond-tiled bell-tower, impressed me by 
its picturesque quaintness. GeoffVy of Monmouth's 
study window is shown, overlooking the church- 
yard. It is he who gives us the story of King 



460 OLD ENGLAND. 

Arthur — the English Herodotus, whose simple 
and confiding genius leads him beyond the bounda- 
ries of sober history. 

The hills lie around encircling the plain which 
widens out quite commandingly here, forming the 
place where two streams meet. On the whole, 
Monmouth pleased and surprised me, and is fit 
to be the birthplace of the hero of the " flaming 
beacon " lighting on to great deeds : though the 
fact is a surprising one, that his fellow-towns- 
men seem to prize good turnips better than past 
renown. 

At the " Beaufort Arms Hotel," I met with two 
English gentlemen who aided me greatly in my 
touring investigations, and I must say, that as a 
tourist I have always obtained from English fellow- 
travelers the most courteous response, and every 
aid that could well be given, leading sometimes 
to considerable personal inconvenience on their 
part. 

Having sated my reader of late with ruins, I 
will leave Raglan Castle without wearying them 
with much additional description. Its heavy mac- 
chiolated towers and antique gateway, on the beau- 
tiful morning that I saw it, with the fine and 
delicate air, answered exquisitely, to my thinking, 
to the entrance of Macbeth's Castle. The red- 
breasted birds hopped around almost tame. It was 
lonely and silent. The dried leaves of autumn 
dropped noiseless in the moat. "With the exception 
of the janitor, the only life seemed to be the birds 



GLASTONBURY AND THE WYE. 461 

and swans. The walls of the ruined keep are 
enormous. The view from its top down into the 
hollow shell of the castle, and the great cavernous 
spaceSj was worth going far to see ; and he who 
visits England without seeing Raglan Castle, Tin- 
tern Abbey, and the river Wye, does not know 
what beauty there is in Old England. 

From Monmouth I went on by coach ten miles 
to Ross, the road following the river, which was for 
the most part shut in by high hills, passing the 
Leys House estate, charmingly situated on a broad 
straight stretch of the Wye, and then losing sight 
of the river for a while until a little beyond Good- 
rich Castle, we came upon it again at Goodrich 
Hope Ferry, four miles or so from Ross. 
; The farms here were very fine, splendidly culti- 
vated, and dotted over with great symmetrical hay- 
ricks. This is said to be the best wheat land in all 
England. 

Ross is situated on a hill-side overhanging a 
broad meadow, and so completely intersected by 
the winding Wye, like a crescent or letter C, that 
the town could not have possibly stood in the val- 
ley if it had been desired to place it there. Here, 
in the principal church, the " Man of Ross " is 
buried ; and the old market - house which he 
founded stands just opposite the house, not now 
existing, where he lived. 

" Behold the market-place, with poor o'erspread, 
The Man of Boss divides the weekly bread." 

This is a pleasant, comfortable, agricultural town, 



462 OLD ENGLAND. 

s 

a place where it would seem, if anywhere, plenty 
and contentment might perpetually dwell ; and 
with this happy and home-like vision on the banks 
of the silvery Wye, mingled with the thoughts of 
charity and peace, I bid my reader a hearty Eng- 
lish "Good-by." 



INDEX. 



A. 

Alfred, and St. Cuthbert, 449 ; his 
division of time, 450. 

Alnwick, town of, 220; castle of, 
220_, seq. 

America, and England, 141, seq. 

Arnold, Dr., his home at Rugby, 
84; as an educator, 88, 91; me- 
morial window at Rugby school 
chapel, 91; monument of, at 
same, 91 ; his home at Fox How, 
193, 194. 

Arreton, 355. 

Art, in London, 42, seq. 

Arthur, King, burial-place of, 444. 

Augustine, Apostle of England, 
315. 



B. 



Bakewell church, 174. 
Bangor, 4, seq. 
Barnstaple, 424. 
"Battle Abbey," 224. 
Battlefield church, 16. 
Beckenham. 305. 
Becket, Thomas a, 313. 
Bemevton church, 350, 351. 
Berry Head, 379. 
Berwick-on-Tweed, 219. 
Berwyn Hills, 14. 
Bettwys-y-Coed, 13. 
Bideford, 424; bridge of, 425; 

" pebble-ridge" at, 425. 
Bilton Hall, 85, 86. 
Birmingham, entrance to, 17; 

"Punch" in, 19. 
Blenheim, 111, 112. 



Bolton Priory, 232. 

Bonchurch, cemetery, 340. 

Botallack mines, 414, 415. 

Bowness, 189. 

Bradford, Gov., 249. 

Brading, 337, 338. 

Brewster, Elder, 244, seq. 

Bridgwater, 433. 

Bright, John, 37, 38. 

Brighton, 326, 327; climate of, 328, 
329. 

Bristol, 118; Sunday at, 450. 

British Museum, 41. 

Britannia Tubular Bridge, 7, 8. 

Brixham, 378, 379. 

Broadmead chapel in Bristol, 120, 
121. 

Bronte, Charlotte, home of, 237, 
238 ; genius of, 239. 

Bronte, Rev. Patrick, sermon by, 
238. 

Brougham, Lord, 39, 40. 

Brunei, his genius, 373. 

Butler, Bishop, tomb of, 119. 

Bushv Park, 77. 

Buxton, 177, 179. 

Byron, Lord, at Matlock, 165; 
where he wrote " The Corsair," 
118; recollection of, 258; tomb 
of, 258; England slow to re- 
adopt his memory, 260 ; statue of 
at Trinity college, Cambridge, 
269. 



c. 

Caernarvon Castle, 8, 9. 
Cambridge University, its situa- 
tion compared with "Oxford, 266 ; 



464 



INDEX. 



Trinity col., 266, seq.; St. John's 
col., 270, seq.; Trinity Hall col., 
273; Caius col., 273;* Clare Hall 
col., 274; King's col., 275; 
Queen's col., 275, 276; St. 
Peter's col., 276 ; Pembroke col., 
277; St. Katharine's col., 278; 
Corpus Christi col., 278; Mag- 
dalene col., 278; Jesus col., 278, 
279; Sidney Sussex col., 279, 
280 ; Christ's col., 282, seq.; Im~ 
manuel col., 284; Downing col., 
285. 

Canterbury, 312 ; cathedral of, 313, 
seq.; chai-ities of, 316 ; " catch- 
club" of, 317, 318. 

Canute, at Ely, 262. 

Capel Cerrig, 12. 

Carisbrooke castle, 334. 

Castleton, 180. 

Cathedrals, English, number of, 
124; lownessof, 160. 

Chad's, St., walk at Shrewsbury, 
15. 

Chalk, region, 319, 320. 

Chatterton, 119, 120. 

Chaucer, house of at Woodstock, 
112. 

Cheltenham, 115. 

Chepstow, 454. 

Chester, 1. 

Cinque Ports, 224. 

Clovelly, village of, 426 ; " Hobby 
road" at, 426; Court, 427. 

Coal, in England, 150 ; probability 
of its exhaustion, 147, 148. 

Coleridge, his room in Jesus col- 
lege, 279 ; his home at Keswick, 
212; his alleged plagiarisms, 
213, 214; his tomb at Highgate, 
215, 216. 

Colliers, 145, 150, 151. 

" Commercial travelers," 345. 

Commons, House of, 34, seq. 

Copper mines, 392. 

Cornwall, little visited, 389 ; scen- 
ery of, 390, 391 ; primitive peo- 
ple of, 398 ; land of pagan relics 
and legends, 409; mines, 392, 
seq.; miners, 394, 395; prayers 
of Cornwall miners, 420. 

Corwen, 13. 

Cotton, John, 250. 

Coventry, 23, 24. 



Cowper, "William, his house at 01- 
ney, 94, 95; memories of, 96, 
97. 

Craik, Rev. Mr., sermon by, 451. 

Crich, 172. 

Cricket, playing, 78. 

Cromwell, Oliver, at Cambridge 
University, 280; portrait of at 
Sidney Sussex college, 281. 

Crosthwaite church, 217. 

Cumming, Dr., 66, 67. 

Cumnor Hall, 113. 

Cuthbert, St., shrine of at Dur- 
ham, 225. 

D. 

Darling, Grace, 219. 

Dawlish, 373, 374. 

" Decorated style " of architecture, 
158, 160. 

Dee, river, 3, 14. 

De Quincv, charges against Cole- 
ridge, 213. 

Derby, 162. 

Derbyshire scenery, 161, 163. 

Derwentwater, lake, 208, 211. 

Devonshire cattle, 362, 363. 

D'Israeli, 38, 39. 

Dorchester, 361. 

Dover, 321, 322. 

Dudley Castle, 144. 

Dunmail Raise, 205. 

Dunstan, St., 447, 448. 

Dunster Castle. 433. 

Durham, 223 ;' cathedral of, 224, 
seq. 



E. 



" Early English," style of archi- 
tecture, 133, seq. 

Edward, the Black Prince, his 
tomb at Canterbury, 314. 

" Elegv in a country churchyard," 
70, 71. 

Ely, cathedral, 262, seq. 

England, scenery of, 455 ; Sunday 
in, 185, seq.; intemperance in, 
23, 24; reform in, 140, 141; holy 
ground, 293; influence of the 
sea upon, 430. 



INDEX. 



465 



English railways, 1, 2; hotels, 4, 
5; cities, finished character of, 
19; unsociability, 26; garden, 
76; muscle, 78; character, 100, 
seq.; suspicion, 105, 106 ; hedge, 
110, 111; cemeteries, 113; farms, 
113 ; piety, cheerful type of, 167 ; 
preaching, 61, 63, 187; inns, 
names of, 318; pronunciation, 
318; fox-hunting, 363; horses, 
364. 

Established Church, present posi- 
tion and influence of the, 68, 69 ; 
worship of the, 69. 

Esthwaite, lake, 191. 

Exeter, 364; High Street of, 365 ; 
cathedral of, 366, seq.; services 
in cathedral, 368 ; bishop of, 371 ; 
scenery about, 372. 

F. 

Earn Islands, 219. 
Farringford, 342. 
Folkestone, 323. 
Fon thill Abbey, 354. 
Fountains Abbev, 231, 232. 
Fox How, 193. 



G. 

Glastonbury, its original meaning, 
441; early home of Christianity, 
442; "holy thorn" of, 443; ab- 
bey of, 443, 444, 448; burial- 
place of Arthur, 444, seq. 

Gloucester, 128, 129 ; cathedral of, 
124, 126. 

Godiva, Lad}', 24. 

Grasmere, 202. 

Gray, Thomas, at Cambridge, 
70. 

"Greta Hall," 211, 212. 

H. 

"Haddon Hall," 172, seq. 
Hall, Rev. Newman, his preach- 
ing, 66. 
Hall, Robert, 121, 122. 
Hampton Court, 72, seq. 
30 



Harrowgate, 229, 230. 

Haworth, 233, seq. 

Helvellyn, 207. 

Herbert, George, story of, 350; 
tomb of, at Bemerton, 351. 

High Church, movement, 421, 422. 

Holman Hunt, his picture of 
" Finding Christ in the Tem- 
ple," 51. 

Hooper, Bishop, scene of his mar- 
tyrdom, 129. 

Hop-growing, 310, 311. 

I. 

Ilfracombe, 429. 

Ives, St., in Cornwall, 398. 



J. 

John, King, his tomb at Worces- 
ter, 136. 

K. 

Keighley, 233. 

Ken, Bp\, his " Morning Hymn," 
439. 

Kenilworth, 23. 

Keswick, vale of, 208; town of, 
211, 212. 

Kew Gardens, 81, seq. 

Kingsley, Charles, his home at 
Eversley, 308; his church at 
Eversley, 310 ; spirit of his writ- 
ings, 309; painter of North 
Devon scenery, 428. 

L. 

Lake country, 189, seq. 

Lamb, Charles, memories of, at 
East India House, 33, 34. 

Landscape painting, in England, 
46, 47. 

Landseer, Sir Edwin, 48. 

Land's End, drive to from Pen- 
zance, 407, seq-; appearance of 
in a storm, 412 ; scene from, 413; 
"vicar of," 416, seq. 



466 



INDEX. 



Lea Hurst, home of Florence 
Nightingale, 168. 

Leamington, 20. 

Leslie, Charles Robert, qualities as 
a painter. 48, 49. 

Lichfield, 152; cathedral of, 156, 
seq. 

Lincoln, 282; cathedral of, 252, 
seq. 

Lincolnshire, its Dutch scenery, 
252. 

Liverpool, 1. 

Llangollen, 14. 

Llugwy, vale of, 13. 

Lodore, falls of, 210, 211. 

Logan stone, 409, 410. 

London, overpowering at first 
sight, 25 ; parks of, 26 ; paradise 
of literary men, 27 ; view from a 
London bridge, 28 ; old churches 
of, 29, 30; points of special in- 
terest in, 31, seq.; " East India 
House " in, 33, 34; the best way 
to see, 40. 

Longfellow, estimation of, in Eng- 
land, 131, 132. 

Lyn, cliff of, 430 ; " water's meet " 
of the Lyn torrents, 431. 

Lynton, 430. 



M. 

Malvern hills, 136. 

Marazion, 401. 

Market Drayton, 15. 

Marsh, Miss, home of, 305; her 

appearance, 306; her source of 

influence, 306. 
" Martvr's memorial," 293. 
Matlock Bath, 163, 166; prices at 

Matlock Bath Hotels, 164. 
Maurice, Rev. F. D., his preaching 

and theologv, 64, seq. 
Melville, Rev^ Henry, 63, 64. 
Menai Strait, 6, 7. 
Michael's Mount. St., 399; the 

ancient Ictis, 402, 403; earliest 

historic point in England, 403 ; 

view from, 404; allusion to, in 

"Lycidas," 405; Bowles' sonnet 

upon, 405. 
Milton, John, at Christ's college, 

Cambridge, 282, seq.; monu- 



ment of, in St. Giles' church ; 
London, 29. 

Monmouth, 459. 

Mount's Bay, 400. 

Miiller, George, sketch of, at Bris- 
tol, 122, ]93 ; sermon by, 453. 

N. 

Names, in hill countries, 192. 

Newark, 255. 

Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 223. 

Newman, Dr., his convent at Bir- 
mingham, 17, seq. 

Newstead Abbey, 260. 

Newton, John, his church at 
OIney, 96. 

Noblemen's estates, 138. 

Norman architecture, 126, seq. 

North Devon, scenery of, 432. 

Northwick, Lord, his picture-gal- 
lery at Cheltenham, 115, seq. 

o. 

Olney, 93, seq. 

"OldSarum," 356,357. 

Ouse, river, 94, 95. 

Oxford, 285 ; " Commemoration 
Day " at, 285, seq.; buildings 
of, 289:*Newcol., 290; Exeter 
col., 290; Brasenose col., 290, 
291; Oriel col., 291; Queen's 
col., 292; Christ Church col., 
292 ; education at, 294, 295. 

P. 

Paley, Dr., birthplace of, 26L 

Pendeen, 415. 

Penmaen-bach, 4. 

Penmaen-mawr, 4. 

Penzance, climate of, 399 ; serpen- 
tine stone works at, 400 ; prim- 
itive character of, 401. 

" Perpendicular style," of archi- 
tecture, 275. 

Peterboro', cathedral of, 261. 

"Peveril of the Peak," 179; castle 
of, 181. 

Pilchard-fishery, 397. 



INDEX. 



467 



"Pilgrim Fathers," who they 

were, 247. 
Plymouth, its harbor, 382; Royal 

Hotel at, 388. 
Portsmouth, 332, 333. 
Primogeniture, English law of, 

139, 140. 
<f Punch," in Birmingham, 19. 
Puritanism, 250. 

E. 

Raglan Castle, 460. 

Raikes, Robert, 129. 

Railway literature, 132, seq. 

Redruth, 391. 

Ripon, 230. 

Richard III., 128. 

Richmond Hill, 81. 

Richmond, Leigh, at Isle of Wight, 

338. 
Robertson, Rev. F. W., at Brigh- 
ton, 329, 330; memoi'ial window 

of at Oxford, 291. 
Robinson, John, 246, 247 : his words 

at Delft Haven, 248; writings 

of, 249. 
Rome, ancient, rule of in Britain, 

321. 
Romsey, 344. 
Ross, 461, 462. 
Rugby, town of, 84; school of, 87, 

90. 
Russel, Lord John, 37. 
Rydal Mount, 194. 
Rydal Water, 201. 

S. 

Salisbury, 346 ; cathedral of, 347, 

seq. 
Saltash, 385. 
u Sanford and Merton," author of, 

154. 
Scott, Dr. Thomas, his house, 99, 

100. 
Scroobv, 241; manor-house of, 

242; "church of, model of N. E. 

churches, 246. 
Severn, river, 15, 16. 
Shakspeare, scene in his church, 

20, 21 ; authorship of his plays, 



" Shakspeare's Cliff," 322. 

Sherwood Forest, 257. 

Shrewsbury, 15. 

Singing, congregational, in Eng- 
lish churches, 69. 

Skiddaw, Mt. 208, 211, 212. 

Snowdon, Mt. 10, 11. 

Somersetshire, land of legends, 
448. 

Southampton, 333. 

Southey, Robert, his home, 212; 
his grave, 218. 

Spurgeon, Rev. Charles, his char- 
acteristics as a preacher, 51, seq. 

Staffordshire, coal-region of, 17. 

Stillingfleet, burial-place of, 136. 

Stoke Pogis, 70, seq. 

Stonehenge, 357, seq. 

Stowell, canon Hugh, 187. 

" Strawberry Hill," 79. 

Sunday-school, festivities, 166, 
167. 

Swallow, cataract of the, 13. 



Teignmouth, 375. 

Tennyson, his home at Farring- 

ford, 342. 
Thames, fountain - head of the, 

118. 
Thirlemere, lake of, 206. 
Tin-mines, 396. 
Tintern Abbey, 457, seq. 
Torbay, 378. 
Torquay, 375, seq. 
Trent, valley and river of the, 

255. 
Troutbeck vale, 192. 
Tunbridge Wells, 325. 
Turner, J. M. W., as a painter, 43, 

seq.; first mountain drawing of 

233 ; at Mt. Edgcuinbe, 385. 
Twickenham, 80. 
Tyndale, William, canon of Christ 

Church college, Oxford, 293. 



u. 



University, the English, vital 
principle of, 296 : scholarship at, 
297 ; moral tone of, 298 ; genial 



468 



INDEX. 



spirit of, 298, 299; government 
of, 300, 301; Fellowships in, 302, 
303. 

V. 

Vane, Sir Henry, 281. 
Venerable Bede, 225. 



w. 

Warkworth Hermitage, 222. _ 

"Water- colors," painting in, a 
peculiarly English art, 49, 50. 

Watlins: street, 311, 319. 

" Wealden Beds," 325. 

"Wells, situation of, 434; tranquil 
air of, 434 ; bishops of, 435 ; ca- 
thedral of, 436, seq. 

Welsh, mountain scenery, 10, seq. 

West, Benjamin, 48. 

Weston Underwood, 96, 97. 

Wharfe, river, 232. 

White, Henry Kirke, 256, 257. 

Wichnor Park, 153. 

Wight, Isle of, 334, seq.; Caris- 
brook castle, 334; Arreton 
church, 335; home of " Dairy- 
man's Daughter," 336; San- 
down, 336; Brading, 337, 338; 
Underclitf, 339 ; Bonchurch, 
340; Ventnor, 339; St. Law- 



rence church, 341; Farringford, 
342. 

William, the Conqueror, his wast- 
ing of the land in Yorkshire, 228; 
his remorse, 228. 

Winchester, 331; cathedral of, 
331. 

Windermere, lake of, 189, 190. 

Wingfield Manor, 171. 

Wilton, 355, church of, 354. 

Wilton House, 352, seq. 

Wolsey, Cardinal, at Hampton 
court, 73 ; at Scrooby, 242. 

Worcester, cathedral of, 132, 133, 
136. 

Wordsworth, William, his appear- 
ance, 195; his indignation at 
American repudiation, 195: his 
sister, 195 : his egotism, 196 ; the 
priest of Nature, 196 ; a Christian 
man, 197 ; his philosophy of Na- 
ture, 198; his love of humanity, 
199, 200; a poet of progress, 
201 ; his grave, 204. 

Wye, river in Derbyshire, 172; 
river in Monmouthshire, scenery 
of the, 455. 

Wyndcliff, view from the, 456. 

Y. 

Yeovil, 361. 

York, 228, 229 ; cathedral of, 229. 



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v -<«^ INDIANA 46962 



